Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: Memento (2000) - Nolan's overrated amnesia mindfuck

8/21/2020

Memento (2000) - Nolan's overrated amnesia mindfuck

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Polaroids of polaroids of polaroids of pola ... on this iconic poster for Christopher Nolan's Memento

A man with 'anterograde amnesia', a condition that lets him remember only fifteen minutes at a time, attempts to avenge his murdered wife through an elaborate system involving Polaroids and tattoos.

Memento is written and directed by English master filmmaker Christopher Nolan (Following (1998)), from a story developed by his brother Jonathan Nolan (Westworld (2016-21)).
Memento is a much hyped psychological drama-thriller that's best the first time around, as its highly mystifying structure impresses considerably. (It is made up of chronologically B/W sequences and chronologically backwards revolving color sequences.)
Guy Pearce (In Her Skin (2009)) is not really that good in Memento, disastrous for a film that also has rather weak first and last half hours, leaving about 50 minutes of a good film in the middle.
Memento delights in its own cognitive veils and invites many interpretations. The unique condition of the protagonist, his tattoos and the editing ploys are what make the film worthwhile.

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Dunkirk (2017) - Nolan champions cinema with masterful war movie
Interstellar (2014) - Nolan heads to space in opulent, exciting epic
2014 in films - according to Film Excess
The Dark Knight Rises (2012) or, Batman and the Storm, Darkness, Anarchy, Evil, Depression
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The Dark Knight (2008) - Nolan's best Batman
Batman Begins (2005) or, Modern, Dark, Smooth Batman
Following (1998) - Nolan's ineffectual debut

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 9 mil. $
Box office: 39.7 mil. $
= Big hit (returned 4.41 times its cost)
[Memento premiered 5 September (Venice Film Festival) and runs 113 minutes. Jonathan Nolan's story idea also turned into his short story Memento Mori (2001). Christopher Nolan was given an initial budget of 4.5 mil. $. Brad Pitt was initially slated to play the protagonist. Shooting took 25 days from September - October 1999 in California, including Los Angeles, and in Las Vegas, Nevada. American distributors were reluctant to bet on the film, despite festival raves, but as production company Newmarket distributed it themselves and found that they had a hit, Miramax's Harvey Weinstein attempted to buy the film away from them, without luck. The film opened #27 to a 235k $ first weekend in 11 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #8 and in 531 theaters, grossing 25.5 mil. $ (64.2 % of the total gross). The foreign market sheet for the film on Box Office Mojo is regrettably incomplete. The film was nominated for 2 Oscars: It lost Best Original Screenplay to Julian Fellowes for Gosford Park and Editing to Black Hawk Down. It was also nominated for a Golden Globe, won 1/3 AFI award nominations, 4/5 Independent Spirit award nominations, a National Board of Review award, an award in Sundance and several other honors. Roger Ebert gave the film a 3/4 star review, translating to a notch higher than this one. IMDb's users have rated the film in at #55 on the site's Top 250, sitting between Apocalypse Now (1979) and Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981). Nolan returned with Insomnia (2002). Pearce returned in The Count of Monte Cristo (2002); Carrie-Anne Moss (Snow Cake (2006)) in Red Planet (2000); and Joe Pantoliano (Waterfront (2006, TV-series)) in A Better Way to Die (2000). Memento is certified fresh at 93 % with an 8.29/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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