Memento

As this is the first of my film reviews, I thought I should probably start with my favourite film, which is as you may have guessed, Christopher Nolan's 2001 neo-noir Memento.

Memento tells the story of former insurance investigator Leonard Shelby (played perfectly by Guy Pearce) as he searches for the man who raped and murdered his wife, and is responsible for Leonard suffering from anterograde memory loss. A form of short term memory loss, where Leonard is unable to remember anything for more than a few moments. 

Structurally, Memento plays in reverse chronological order, for the most part anyway. The colour sequences are primarily of Leonard searching for his wife's killer, whilst the black and white section has Leonard talking on the phone to an unknown person about his past, and how came to the situation he is in. To simplify, the colour sequences run "backwards", whilst the black and white run in correct chronological order.

The reason for the structure is clear, and in terms of the story, essential. Without the use of the structure we would witness the narrative unfold from an objective perspective, and would be more aware of what has happened than Leonard is. With it running backwards, we experience it from Leonard's perspective, which gives us a very subjective view of the story.

The lead character of Leonard, as previously mentioned played perfectly by Guy Pearce comes across as first being a one dimensional character who is simply out for vengeance, but as the film progresses we see pieces of his past and his actions that build this complicated character, who struggles on in the attempt to find his wife's killer with this major block in front of him at all times.

The two main supporting characters of Teddy (Joe Pantoliano), the man Leonard kills at the beginning (or the end, depending on how you view it) as he believes him to be the killer. As well as Natalie (Carrie-Ann Moss), a bar maid who helps Leonard track down Teddy. Are both played superbly, bringing out these characters that would just as soon help Leonard as they would plot and use him to their own ends.

Delivering a final verdict on this film is easy for me, as I would highly recommend it to anyone for a multitude of reasons, some of which have been discussed above. Quite simply it is a must see film.

Score: *****(5/5)