MEMENTO

MEMENTO

Directed by Christopher Nolan. Starring Guy Pearce, Carrie Ann Moss, Joe Pantoliano

While the notion of a thriller which runs chronologically backwards might sound like a confusing or downright self-defeating project from the offset (not to mention a mite pretentious - see the Martin Amis novel Time's Arrow), Memento makes for a strikingly effective and wholly original psychological jigsaw-puzzle. The film is made even more intriguing by the fact that its events are entirely filtered through the central protagonist Leonard Shelby (Pearce, in a virtuoso performance), a man with virtually no capacity for short-term memory. Hence, each scene lasts as long as Leonard's limited memory span, and the audience is relentlessly thrown back to square one.

The put-upon Leonard's mental impairment is undoubtedly a hindrance, considering his chief goal - which is to track down the man who raped and killed his wife, whose initials he knows to be 'J.G.' He compensates by taking Polaroids, making hastily-scribbled notes, and tattooing details such as the killer's car-registration number all over his body. Memento commences with Leonard's murder of the shifty-looking Eddie, on whose photo Leonard has inscribed the words 'He is the one. Kill him.'

Prior to this, we see the film's femme-fatale figure Natalie helping Leonard trace J.G.'s car reg details. All we know about her are the words scribbled on Leonard's photo of her:- 'she has lost someone too, she will help you'.

It transpires that the person Natalie has lost is her boyfriend Jimmy, a local drug-dealing hoodlum who went to meet a man called Teddy and never returned. However, when Leonard discovers a photo of a beaten-and-gagged man, it suddenly becomes apparent that Leonard's memory deficit may be being exploited by those with less noble intentions, prompting a visit to Natalie to discern what the fuck is going on.

Lost the plot yet? Impenetrable though it might sound, the film's fragmented structure actually works impeccably well - and while patches of Memento are stilted and a shade contrived, it sucks you in without ever becoming as disorientating as its plot synopsis might sound. Ultimately, it's not a thriller which relies solely on revelations, given that the opening scene reveals the bleak finale. Rather, this is a complex delve into memory and how it can serve to subvert rather than illuminate the truth.

Complex, compelling and replete with more grim twists and turns than the Peace Process, Memento won't change your life, but it'll certainly liven it up for a couple of hours if you give it the chance.