Surprisingly original noir, but with a disappointing end

Rating: 8/10 (8 November 2006)

Christopher Nolan make a memorable movie. Unfortunately it's ruined by a too easy ending; the most important thing (and, certainly, the most difficult), I think, for a thriller story, is choosing a "good" guilty: solve a story like this one, it means not-choose at all, perhaps for fear of failing. In this way it really disappoints us, because it was a very well realized low cost story, with a great screenplay (taken from a book), some hilarious situation, and a surprising mechanism: it starts at the end and proceed on the contrary, jumping some time back to show us how it went at the initial situation, then it jumps more time back to explain how it went at the second situation, and so on, flashback after flashback. It's all in the same linear (but reverse) chronology so it's always easy to follow and understand. It's a story of a brilliant detective who works for an insurance company that one night find his wife raped and murdered, and it's hit himself by the mysterious John G. whom he swear revenge searching him, because the police don't believe at his version of the facts. Little detail: after the barrel he lost his brief memory, which means that he can remember all his life before the night of the murder, but after can remember everything only for fifteen minutes. So he forces himself to a methodical research of the murderer with lots of tattoos, notes and photos of his Polaroid, to remember himself all that he's discovering after that night, because every fifteen minutes his mind cleans every facts. But of course he must be careful, and ready, of that he writes on his notes. Besides, the others who know his problem, and tell that are helping him, could swindle himÂ… Guy Pearce plays well in a role half-way between Goofy (of Mickey Mouse) and Ed Exley (of LA Confidential)