scribble some down, take some pictures

Rating: 9/10 (28 April 2002)

...because otherwise you definitely will get a little confused watching this film for the first time. Not only is the main narration told backwards, it is also interspersed with black and white clips from a sequence which is told in correct chronological order and turns out to be the beginning of the main narration. Or its end, depending on how you wanna look at it. In short, two storylines are told simultaneously, one of them backwards, the other one not and in the end they are connected at the beginning of the one told backwards and the end of the other one. Pheew. This is what you are going to have to keep in mind if you are interested in understanding what the hell is going on, you are going to have to memorize the scenes and put them into the right order in your mind.
SPOILERS AHEAD

This structure alone would be sufficient to make "Memento" one of the most innovative and clever films of the last ten years. But Mr Nolan not only gives us an interesting puzzle (is he the killer? If not, who is the killer? Why did he kill him? And who the hell is this anyway?) that is solved in the last scene. He uses the structure to put the audience - without its knowledge - right into the head of a handicapped man who's whole mission is hopeless from the very beginning. But he does not know that, and neither does the viewer until the very last scene which makes the entire pointlessness of his actions painfully apparent: His entire life is a ballgame since "the incident". He is the ball. To all the people around him he is just a useful retard they can play with like a marionette. Yet he does not realize this, and Christopher Nolan's great merit is it to keep the viewer from knowing that until the very end.
That is why the ending comes as such a big twist. It is just on account of the outstandingly clever directing. I mean, it should be obvious the second you hear about it: a guy who can't remember a thing ten minutes after he has killed someone wants to investigate the murder of his wife, give me a break. Everyone else in the film knows this, and that is exactly why everyone is using him, including himself. And when the viewer finally gets to realize this, it is a definite jawdropper, as if oneself had been the retard the for last 100 minutes and is just waking up.
As for the other aspects for the film, the editing is very good and adds a lot to the atmosphere, as does a great score. Guy Pearce is even better than in LA Confidential. I liked the contrast of the color with the very beautiful black and white cinematography. Watch out for the moment when both storylines connect and color streams into the black and white picture!
Maybe one of the best, definitely an extremely clever movie worth watching three or more times.
Fact 1: You cannot believe those liars who were bored by this film. Fact 2: You will have to go see it. Fact 3: A ten out of ten.
(if that does not convince you, go see it for the very stylish tattoos)