Pretty Good STUDENT Film

Rating: 6/10 (2 June 2001)

I can't believe the number of people that have been taken in by "Memento". Sure, it's a clever idea to start a murder mystery at the end and work back to the beginning. However, it's just as well that "Memento" did it that way, because the story does NOT stand up to even average scrutiny. Worse, it is played out in a sluggish manner, the conclusion of which would be obvious about 15 minutes before the denoument, had the film makers not resorted to cheating (Something a genuinely great film such as "The Sixth Sense" never did.
The always excellent Guy Pierce plays a former insurance investigator who is searching for the men who raped and killed his wife and left him with brain damage, leaving him incapable of creating new memories. This forces Pierce to take some drastic actions (including tatooing his body with important clues) in order to maintain enough coherency to pursue his quest. He is aided(?) by a waitress (Carrie-Ann) Moss and a mystery man (Joe Palantiano). As, I said, the story plays itself out in reverse. That's a pretty easy task, even for a student film maker. Just edit the story out of sequence. Big deal!
DEFINITE SPOILERS AHEAD
1. The film relies on coincidence. Joe Palantiano's character has the same initials as the rapist. 2. Joe Palantiano is an undercover cop. Yet, he never tells Pierce after the first killing, even when he knows Pierce could kill him. Certainly, if he is hanging around for the money, he might try looking in the trunk of Pierce's car. Pierce probably doesn't know it is there. 3. Pierce has false memories which deceive the audience. 4. Dodd, the "big time" drug dealer comes alone, even though a HUGE amount of cash is involved. By the way, just WHERE does a guy with no memory hide a huge stash of cash? 5. Dodd is easily subdued by Pierce. 6. Moss's characters actions are inconsistent.
An interesting experiment, but rather sluggish and with unsympathetic characters.