Don't Answer the Phone!

Rating: 10/10 (13 May 2002)

If I had to choose one word to sum up this movie it'd be 'ingenious.'

Leonard Shelby has a rare memory disorder - he can't remember anything since he had a blow on the head after fighting with his wife's killer. He knows everything about himself up to that point, but new memories gradually fade and are quickly lost. He'll be talking to someone but will forget how the conversation started. He'll wake up in a hotel room completely ignorant of how he got there. Since his last memory is of his dying wife, he lives in grief and his only goal in life is to catch and kill John G - his wife's murderer.
The film opens with the final scene in the plot and gradually takes you back through the story so that you only know why events take place after they've occurred.
This means that you instantly empathize with Leonard - there's no way you couldn't as like him, you don't 'remember' what's gone before. It's a rare breed - a movie that manages to transfer you into the mind of the main character using the film making technique rather than the plot. Like it or not, while watching it YOU TOO have a memory disorder and are forced to see the world through Leonard's eyes - truly ingenious.
As it goes on, you gradually realise that all isn't it seems and nobody is as they appear. I'm not going to give anything else away as it'll spoil it, but suffice it to say that it has a great twisting story, excellent acting and is shot beautifully in a minimalist noirish kind of way.
It's a film that needs multiple viewings - I certainly had to watch it two or three times before I understood exactly what's going on, but when all the pieces finally fit together it's a great feeling. The region 2 DVD has a hidden feature that allows one to watch the film rearranged in the correct order (it even has the credits running backwards at the beginning etc) which means that when you've finally worked it all out, you can check that your deductions are correct and that you properly understood. This is a brilliant feature and certainly adds to the film's longevity.
There are very few films that offer an experience as engrossing as this, although it's not for everyone. If you're the kind of person that likes to work things out for yourself using the available evidence (just like Leonard) then this is for you. If you like your movies to be clear cut and easy to understand on the original viewing, this may not be to your taste.
For me, it's one of the greatest films of recent years and comes wholeheartedly recommended.