complex, sometimes confusing, and worth repeat viewings

Rating: 8/10 (15 August 2002)

This movie has received rave reviews and falls into the same category as your Usual Suspects and to a lesser degree, Pulp Fiction. The story is told in reverse fashion, like the Seinfeld episode a few years back when they went to India to see Elaine's friend get married and George didn't want to take his boots off and Kramer was hexed. Anyway, the story involves a dude who has some sort of long term memory loss and can only remember things with Polaroid photos and notes that he's tatooed onto himself. Like the Usual Suspects, we get swallowed up in the mystery, but here we are not so much wondering 'whodunit' as 'what is going on here.' This works for 75% of the movie, but there are bits in the middle and the ending especially drag it down a notch. I loved watching it, but at the end felt cheated. Maybe it merits another look-see as I certainly got confused while watching it. This is a good movie, but it's not one that you'll be raving about for years on end like Pulp Fiction. It lacks the style and snappy dialogue of that movie. Memento as a whole is very entertaining and one of the better movies you will find, but not quite 'great'.