Memento (2000)

Memento

I watched the film Memento, as my media teacher told me it is a great film. I watched the beginning of it in class and then decided to watch it at home. I found this film very different from other thriller films, as it is shown backwards.

It is directed by Christopher Nolan, the story is about a man who is on the search to find his wife's killer, and his attacker. Two men broke into his house and raped and murdered his wife. He was knocked unconscious by one of the guys. This attack gave him amnesia, the only thing he remembers about his past, is the brutal murder of his wife. It stopped his brain from storing new memories. All the evidence he finds is tattooed onto his body, and he keeps Polaroid photos, and writes notes on them so he can remember all the evidence/information he has found.

The film is in black and white an in colour, the parts that are in black and white are chronologically ordered unlike the coloured scenes which is in reverse order.

Analysis of the opening titles

As the titles are going on, there is a low angle close up shot, of a polaroid photo being held. The photo shows a wall covered in blood . The photo is shaken and appears to have faded in colour. This is repeated another 3 times until the photo turns blank.

The camera cuts to the person holding the photo, you can only see his wedding ring, beige suit and blue shirt. The camera tilts up and rewinds, on what happened before the photo was taken. There is a close up shot of the mans face, you can see dried blood near his eye. It cuts to dripping blood, a bullet, a pair of bloody glasses and a man's head surrounded with blood. Their is a high medium shot of the man in the beige suit, the camera tilts down following the character. It quickly rewinds and shows him shooting the man. Then fades to black, there is a black and white close up shot of his mouth, nose and eyes.

In Memento there is slow instrumental music, there are no beats. The music hints to the audience, that this film deals with emotionally issues. The blue coloured titles add to the emotion of sadness, (the colour blue is usually associated with sadness). The music continues until the flash of the camera, this sound is sharp and loud. When the scene replays you an hear the bullet rolling and the movement of the glasses. The gunshot is loud and you can hear the man shouting.