Actions speak louder than memories

Rating: 9/10 (12 May 2005)

While "Memento" is a difficult to follow film, it's not excruciatingly difficult. I'm not certain I agree with Teddy's version of the ending (or beginning as it were), but I'm not certain I can disagree with it either. The sequence of events and the way in which they are presented to the audience as well as the reason for this manner of presentation require the viewer to question everything. Not only do we begin to question the events of the movie but we begin to question the events in our own lives and the way in which we recall them. Is it our memories which make us what we are or is it our actions?
"Memento" is presented as what I find to be the ultimate form of a mystery; however it's a flip version of our usual concept of a mystery. Most mysteries are said to be written by beginning at the end and finishing with the mysterious beginning. These mysteries are then presented to us beginning with the mystery and ending with the resolution. This film on the other hand, seems to have been written from the beginning (if we take Teddy's revelations at the end of the film to be true) where this sequence of tracking down John G. begins and Leonard's reasons for it. Leonard sets himself up to murder who is supposedly the wrong man knowing that he will forget his own setup. But, when we watch the movie this is the ending. We begin watching "Memento" from the resolution of the conflict when Leonard decides that Teddy is the John G. who raped and killed his wife and enacts his vengeance upon him.
Whenever a film is presented in a backwards form it's not only difficult to follow but difficult to put together and edit properly in the first place. The director used scenes moving backwards but the beginnings and endings of each scene overlapped just enough with the following scene. This method I think is what held the film together so well. It allows the viewer to question what happened just before the current scene while allowing them to see how it connects with the previous scene.
Teddy at one point brings up the possibility of Leonard's pictures and notes being false and that he has no way to verify them. Leonard replies by saying that "Memories are an interpretation, not records." Are our memories any better than photos? Aren't they just as difficult to verify? The difference between a Polaroid and our own memory is that a Polaroid is more easily shared with another, though we may not share their interpretation of it. Memories also have a kind of emotional attachment to them. Certain memories we block out because we have negative associations regarding them whereas many other memories come to our mind quickly because they fit into our belief system more readily.
I think that Leonard's photographs and notes represent our memories in possibly a more manageable form. He does indeed have an emotion attachment to many of them. So attached that he tattoos many of them onto his own skin. He takes photos of those things he deems important. These are the memories he wants to be able to recall. But what of all of the things he sees which he has opportunities to take snap shots of but doesn't? He also alters his memories by crossing out notes on certain photographs and burning others. When he decides that he wants to kill Teddy in the future he sets himself up by writing on Teddy's photograph "don't believe his lies". He's purposely altering the photo to associate it with something negative and to lead him to believe Teddy was his wife's rapist.
Others also have the ability to alter his memory to their advantage. Natalie seems like a sympathetic person who's trying to help Leonard but we later find out that she has played with his memory to make him believe she needed help. Teddy also manipulates Leonard's memory many times, most obviously by using him as a tool to kill undesirables who could pass as Leonard's "John G." Others can alter our memories by displaying to us that which is false, or by manipulating memories we already have but may be vague.
A number of times in the film Leonard speaks of action. Is it our memories that make us who we are or is it the actions we perform? Leonard doesn't seem to be a different person throughout the movie. He has the same memories throughout it. His mind always starts off at the same place. But, do his actions in his different points of awareness make him a different person in each? One might argue that since he's acting from the same belief system that he is the same person. I tend to agree with this. Over and over again he's given the chance of killing his wife's rapist. Over and over again he chooses to do so. While he's blocked out the memories of his actions, they all seem to be based on the same set of beliefs. It's like with the case of Sammy Jenkis (or Leonard as we later find out). Every time he gave his wife her insulin shot he did so out of love. He didn't remember that he had done this already and thus she allowed him to kill her, but he was simply acting upon those beliefs which he thought was right.
"Memento" is a true puzzle. I say this because it's not just an incoherent mix of various scenes and various people. Everything is interconnected and it's up to the viewer to piece the puzzle together. This may imply something about our minds as well. We have this collection of scenes and people in our memories and its up to us to decide how we wish to put them into place.