Viewers always have a strange fascination for Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster works, which range from his paradoxical art Inception (2010) to his mysterious thriller The Dark Knight Rises (2012) to his astonishing scientific Interstellar (2014) and recently to his monumental war film Dunkirk (2017). Instead of presenting a story in its chronological order, the director is well-known for constructing intricately layered plots like an enigma, demonstrating them in such a way that challenges the viewer’s intelligence while simultaneously engaging their mind with psychology concepts. Among these, Nolan's Memento (2000) serves as one of the most classic and perplexing psychological thrillers of the 21st century. The movie revolves around Leonard Shelby, who experiences short-term memory loss and struggles to search for the person who murdered his wife. Memento’s unique plot becomes a key factor in the movie’s successful story-telling technique. Its chronologically backwards structure, which challenges viewers to keep up with the story, accomplishes two remarkable effects: restricting viewers to the protagonist’s mental state and perception, as well as challenging the assumptions that viewers might have towards the characters in the movie. All of these aforementioned accomplishments shape viewers’ understanding of Memento, ultimately expressing Leonard’s uncertainty and skepticism towards each event happening to him after experiencing anterograde amnesia and being unable to form new memories.
Memento’s backwards chronological plot enables viewers to be in Leonard’s shoes and empathize with his experience. The investigation adventure unfolds from his perspective, yet the plot also restricts viewers’ knowledge to Leonard's observations, which ultimately shapes their understanding of the movie. As viewer’s understanding is limited to Leonard’s point of view, they never know what is happening when a scene starts because they are traveling backwards through time. To be specific, every color scene is in a reverse sequence and each indicates approximately ten minutes of the storyline, which represents the lengths of Leonard’s memory. These segments are intertwined by shorter sections of black and white scenes in chronological order that make up one sub-plot in which Leonard is talking on the phone with an unknown cop. Here, Nolan uses reverse plot to magnify the restrictive narration, revealing only Leonard's perception and feelings. This restrictive narration causes uncertainty in Memento and force viewers to put the puzzle pieces together from the protagonist’s mindset. For instance, the scene in which Leonard meets Natalie in a restaurant shows Leonard’s trying to read Natalie’s body language and figure out what kind of person she is. Likewise, viewers see this woman on screen for the first time and it’s difficult for them to understand thoroughly her purposes and her role in the movie. In this scene, Natalie seems visually disappointed that Leonard wasn’t able to remember her, but she eventually gives Leonard the number plate of a guy called John G. Without fail, in all of Memento’s scenes, the camera is either over Leonard’s shoulder or taking close-ups of the main character. Through this way of cinematography, a solid relationship between the viewers and Leonard is established. In short, due to the backwards chronological plot which leads to restrictive narration, viewers are constantly alert, drawing clues about the movie’s context from Leonard’s actions and the ways in which other characters react to them.
Memento’s backwards chronological plot also challenges the assumptions and stereotypes that viewers may hold towards each character in the movie. Throughout the film’s current and flashback scenes, each character’s personalities are gradually revealed and transformed. By beginning the movie with its conclusion, Nolan’s use of the reverse technique builds suspense and structures the plot so as to invite viewers into the mystery of Teddy’s death. Viewers might assume that Teddy is the person who killed Leonard’s wife, and Leonard is the antagonist of the movie. However, as the movie goes on, the question of who the true antagonist is is brought into consideration. Is it Natalie, who manipulated Leonard into kidnapping Dodd, or is it John G, who was supposed to kill his wife, or is it Leonard himself, who chose to ignore the facts and lied to himself to be happy? Nolan keeps viewers guessing by withholding a primary piece of information until the very end of the film, Leonard’s self-deception. The most compelling revelation lies at the end of Memento in which Leonard’s conflicts aren’t just a consequence of his condition, but he deliberately lies to himself. It turns out that Sammy's story was indeed Leonard's story. Leonard’s wife was still alive after the incident but could not deal with his condition, so she decided to have him kill her with the insulin used to treat her diabetes. After hearing Teddy’s explanation, Leonard refuses to believe it. But then, he gets the idea of forgetting about what Teddy told him and manipulating his notes to lead to an unexpected conclusion that Teddy was his wife’s murderer. What can be clearly seen from this ending scene is that Leonard isn’t completely lying to himself; he is guilty of confirmation bias, accepting only the facts that affirm his previous conclusions. Moreover, Leonard is not the only character in the film who is not what he seemed. Throughout the film, Teddy’s appearance gives the impression to viewers that he actually developed a real sympathy and friendship towards Leonard. However, as viewers reach the end, Teddy turns out to be a dirty undercover cop, simply having Leonard go around different towns finding drug dealers, setting up fake deals, and making him kill these people so that he can earn the money. Another complex character of Memento, Natalie has the personality of a caregiver, a woman who would voluntarily go out of her way to help the innocent. Nevertheless, her character takes a dramatic twist as the plot reveals the pivotal role that she plays in this game. Natalie’s manipulation of Leonard to get rid of Dodd and Teddy in order to revenge for her boyfriend shows her true personality as a convolutedly mysterious woman. As a consequence, Memento’s backwards narrative structure allows viewers to make their own assumptions of the characters, from then on expands their minds with plot twists and surprises of their true identities and roles in the movie.
In conclusion, Nolan’s remarkable motion pictures always take viewers out of the lavish spectacle and conventional ideologies of Hollywood films, presenting a more distinctive portrayal of human psychology through unique perspectives. With the backwards chronological structure and the combination of color as well as black and white sequences, Memento is, without a doubt, an excellent representation of how the plot differs from the story in such a way that successfully captures viewers’ attention. Memento’s plot is presented with subtlety, hiding in and out of every frame, and continues to haunt the viewers hours and days after the film has ended.
Works Cited
Nolan, Christopher. Memento. 2000. Summit Entertainment.
Sims, David. How Memento Set The Framework For Christopher Nolan’s Career. March, 2016. The Atlantic.