Christopher Nolan is the director of Memento, released in 2000. He is a British-American film director. He also produces and does screen writing. Nolan is the founder of Syncopy Films, which is a production company. He and his brother and screenwriter, Jonathan Nolan, often collaborate with each other . He also works with his wife, who is also his producing partner. He was born in London in 1970. His father was an advertising copywriter and his American mother was flight attendant. Nolan is a dual citizen of the UK and the US. He is most well known for his films Inception (2010), Batman Begins (2005), The Dark Knight (2008), Insomnia (2002), The Prestige (2006) as well as Memento. The main genre of his films are thriller.
Memento is a thriller, based on the short story, Memento Mori written by his brother Jonathan Nolan. It follows Leonard Shelby, who suffers short term memory loss of 15 minutes. The film is a sequence of events that are in reversed order, but this does not become clear to the end. Leonard had an 'incident' that caused his short term memory and also we are lead to believe his wife was raped and murdered. He has covered his body in tattoos to try and solve who murdered and raped his wife so that he can kill them. Along side the reversed sequence of events, there are multiple 'flashback' scenes that eventually help to solve the story. In the end we find out the man who Leonard murders at the start is infact not the killer, it was just someone who Leonard had decided he was going to murder. Th man, Teddy, was a police man who was trying to 'help' Leonard but was also using him to get rid of drug dealers etc. In fact, Leonard had already killed the men who tried to kill his wife. We also find out the story that is being told in the flashback images about 'Sammy', is in fact himself, meaning that Leonard had actually killed his wife accidently through an insulin overdose.
The opening sequence of Memento it is clear that someone has been murdered. There is a hand holding a polariod picutre that he then shakes until the picture dissapears. From here the sequence runs in reverse as we see a man being shot. There is non-diegetic background music which creates tension, as we don't actually know what is going on as there is no speech. We can only tell through the action, which is confusing anyway due to it going backwards. This is key however for the rest of the film, as it is in reversed order. The opening scene is quite abstract to begin with, which is quite typical in thrillers. It also shows that there is some kind of murder involved, which is once again very typical of a thriller.
Key scene 1- Revealing of the 'Never answer the phone tattoo'. This scene is very tense, as there is an ordinary situation of answering the phone. However, this becomes something that Leonard shouldn't be doing. The fact that he is revealing a lot of personal information over the phone to someone he doesn't know creates a lot of tension in itself. This is added to even more when he lifts up the plaster to reveal a tattoo that says 'never answer the telephone'. We now feel on edge as the audience because we know that he has been telling someone that he shouldn't be a lot of information. We automatically assume this will lead to something bad.
Key scence 2- Leonard hits Natalie. This scene shows Natalie coming into the house after being hit. She explains to Leonard that it was Dodd who had hit her after doing what Leonard had told her to do. However, as the scenes run in reversed order, it then reveals that Natalie had actually been winding up Leonard calling him stupid etc. leading him to hit her. We now know as the audience that Natalie is using Leonard, so that he can kill Dodd. Leonard 'Achilles heel' is being exploited by Natalie, which is a typical convetion of thrillers.
My opinion of Memento is firstly that it is confusing throughout and you need to keep close attention the whole way through, or you will not understand. However, what I did like about this film is that at the end, when you finally put all the pieces together and work it out, it makes you realise that the film is actually extremely clever. I also thought that the flashback scenes were really good at keeping the film tense and kept me gripped as a viewer. This is because there is witheld information to us, we don't know who is actually on the phone and who he is revealing so much information to, making us feel on edge for Leonard.
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