Memento

Memento has been lurking on my lists for over a decade. I think I saw it once, in high school or college, but I always wondered if I missed something. At the same time, I gradually lost interest. It feels good to check it off, definitively, now, and it feels good to have liked it. It feels good not to grow more and more resentful of Christopher Nolan.

This might be the movie of his that I can dislike the least. Not that I really dislike any of his movies -- but they all have things I dislike, all except Memento. This is the most solid, least problematic Nolan movie I've seen. Even Interstellar, my favorite of them, is totally gross at times. Half the time I find myself talking about it, I'm mocking it. Memento, though, gives me nothing to tease, other than perhaps Guy Pearce's hairdo. But that's just the era. Writing-wise, it's the mellowest affair, the modest one, brainy without being flashy, noir instead of superheroes/astronauts/demigods/time-travelers/dream-stealers. It's just a guy with a condition. It's high-concept (like Tenet) without losing its humanity (unlike Tenet). Now, I actually like the fantastical premises of his flashier movies, but I don't like how they translate to flashy, superficial characters+dialogue. I want Nolan to blend his cerebral plots with fantastical settings AND down-to-earth dialogue. He's yet to achieve that, in my memory, but Memento is one of the more successful balancing acts. As far as making a solid movie, I'd take authentic writing over flashiness, even if, for making a memorable movie, I'd take the flashiness. In that sense -- appropriately -- Memento isn't his most memorable movie, other than the fact that it was maybe his breakthrough (so it felt flashier at the time). It's like Reservoir Dogs, which isn't Tarantino's flashiest, but is a landmark and a breakthrough. In fact, it's a lot like Reservoir Dogs...

I wish they could have gotten Brad Pitt as they apparently proposed. I can't confirm that I've seen Guy Pearce in anything else, and he doesn't quite have the presence to make this all work. He's just a Guy.