An intriguing downer

Rating: 5/10 (2 January 2002)

I didn't have too much trouble following this film after the first ten minutes - maybe because I'm a touch dyslexic, and I'd seen the backward Seinfeld wedding-in-India episode several times. It was ingenious that while the central character had his puzzle to figure out, we as an audience were given one that paralleled his.
But the further Memento progressed, the more I felt that I neither liked nor related to any of the characters, who become more one-dimensional the further back in time we encounter them, and that then becomes who they really are. It's not a film I would have cared to see had it been chronological.
Take Groundhog Day, make it the others in the film who know what's going on, then change it from a comedy to a moody thriller with a bunch of sleazeballs, and you have Memento. It gives the impression not only that nothing is as it seems, but that no one can be trusted, and everyone is parasitic when given the opportunity. It's sad that so many people have praised it, given it's jaundiced view of humanity.
Yes, it's a milestone, a new Third Man for the new century. I recommend it only as a study in film-making and storytelling. You may smile at the tricks in the unfolding of the magic. But if you have the simple desire to see real, complex characters -- with both good sides and human failings -- they won't turn up in Memento.
By the end - or beginning, as it were -- the completion of the puzzle only creates an ugly, slimy picture. It's like watching the magician pull a dead rabbit from his hat. At a different time in my life, I'd have been a lot more impressed.