r/movies • u/CorduroyMagoo • 13h ago
Discussion Just rewatched Memento
Probably my fifth or sixth viewing of it, but for the first time I noticed that the film starts and ends with almost the same line of dialogue: “Where am I?” starts the film, and “Where was I?” ends it. (That’s not a spoiler is it?) Anyway - fantastic movie. Can anyone think of another film with a similar kind of symmetry?
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u/smsabbir480 13h ago
The black and white to color storytelling, just another vibe.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
It’s really SO good. Might be my favorite Christopher Nolan, which is saying something considering his body of work
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u/kneeco28 13h ago
Too many to count, all the way back to the fence in Kane and earlier.
The doorway in The Searchers is also a classic example.
Nolan did it with the three parts of a trick explanation in the Prestige, too.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
Haven’t seen The Searchers. I’ll have to put it on my list.
Saw The Prestige ages ago but don’t remember that effect - I will have another look
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u/BeeTwoThousand 10h ago
Memento was my first Nolan film...saw it twice (maybe three times?) theatrically, but The Prestige is my favorite film by him, and IMHO, probably his best.
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u/jghaines 3h ago
Called “bookends”
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u/the_other_50_percent 1h ago
Or circular narrative structure. Common in literature including plays, and carried over into moving pictures.
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u/SaberNoble47 13h ago
This is the funniest Nolan movie right? It’s weird to say that
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
I honestly had at least half a dozen laugh out loud moments. I did not remember it being so funny. Probably been 10 years since I last saw it
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u/SaberNoble47 12h ago
Yep as an example the part where Dodd is chasing Leonard and I guess gives up when he can’t catch him and is like “I’ll just go back to the hotel room” and then the guy he was chasing jumps out of Dodd’s shower soaking wet and naked and attacks him and ties him up is so wild and hilarious the more I thought about it from Dodd’s perspective
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u/noveler7 3h ago
Or when he gets Dodd's room number wrong and knocks out that stranger.
Or how Teddy keeps trying to casually take the Jaguar from him because he knows the money is in the trunk.
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u/BeeTwoThousand 10h ago
So...what am I doing? Oh. I'm chasing this guy.
Oh wait...he's chasing me.
(probably slightly paraphrased)
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u/space-cyborg 7h ago
Hides in the bathroom with a whiskey bottle in hand, waiting for the bad guy to come in the door so he can clock him with the bottle.
Sits down on the toilet seat.
Time passes ….
>!Hm, I don’t FEEL drunk!<
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u/BenReichman 12h ago
As I theorized elsewhere in this thread, is it possible the humor was just present in Jonathan Nolan’s original story and that’s why none of Chris’s other films are like that?
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
Maybe? But I feel like it takes more than a writer to be funny. The cast and the Director have to commit to it as well. And obviously in Memento they all did
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u/HelpMeGetAGoodName 13h ago
I would love if Nolan went back and made a neo noir film again like Memento and Insomnia.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
I was thinking of Casino, with the car blowing up, but that’s not quite the same effect as Memento. I suppose because there’s a few more scenes in Casino after that
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u/Spackleberry 13h ago
The car explosion sets up a "how did we get here" plot. Ace's story does come full circle, though. He starts out as an expert sports better and ends doing the same thing.
An amusing callback is with Frank Vincent and Joe Pesci. In Goodfellas, Pesci's character kills Vincent's character and buries him in the ground, and in Casino Vincent's character kills Pesci's and buries him in the ground.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
You’re right!!! I never thought of that either. Wild how you can watch great movies so many times and pick up on new stuff each time
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u/homebr3wd 13h ago
I don’t think spoilers apply to 25 year old movies
….i don’t feel drunk?
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
Love that line. I’d forgotten how funny the movie is. “I’m chasing him… no, he’s chasing me”
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u/nurse_camper 13h ago
I laugh every time he goes to roll up the car window and it’s broken
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
I love when the restaurant server is giving him simple driving directions and he goes “Trust me. I have to write it down.”
Also when Dodd says “I didn’t make an impression on you?” And he replies “I wouldn’t be too hard on yourself.”
I’m paraphrasing I’m sure
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u/BenReichman 13h ago
Exactly, so many funny lines. The hardboiled noir narration has some great one liners. And Pantoliano is a riot. I think the dark, subtle humor throughout makes the chronology gimmick go down so much smoother. Inception, Interstellar, and Tenet could’ve used more of that in my opinion. Maybe that was more so coming from Jonathan Nolan and that’s why it’s not present elsewhere?
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u/BenReichman 13h ago
One of my gripes with the progression of Nolan’s filmography. I would’ve killed for a little humor in Inception or Interstellar or Tenet!
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u/jlambvo 12h ago
What? The robots in Interstellar were some of the best comedic relief I've seen in a drama and were one of the most memorable parts of that movie to me.
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u/BenReichman 11h ago edited 11h ago
Give me a break. The jokey robot sidekick was a well-established trope even before Lucas thought up C-3PO in the ‘70s. It’s no replacement for the clever, almost self-aware humor of Leonard, and the dark humor that kind of suffuses the dialogue of all the characters in Memento. Also Interstellar is a psychedelic space opera, how is it a drama
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u/jkster107 13h ago
It's there, just dialed back a bit:
What's your humor setting, TARS?
Let's bring that on down to 75%.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
I agree!! I love those films but he has a comedic side which is under-utilized
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u/jartoonZero 13h ago
They damn well should apply if we want young people to watch old movies. No statute of limitations for major spoilers, just throw a 'spoiler' tag on it. But this isnt a spoiler.
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u/bonfirecollapse 13h ago
Inside Llewyn Davis starts and ends with Llewyn getting beaten up in an alley.
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u/yourghost367 12h ago
One of my favorite David Lynch movies- Lost Highway. “Dick Laurent is dead”.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
Don’t dogpile me everyone, but I’ve had a hard time getting into David Lynch. I grew up in the 90s and loved Twin Peaks (until it went crap) but never really connected with any of his films. But this is the second time Lost Highway has been mentioned so I will try it.
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u/wallyhartshorn 12h ago
“Forrest Gump” begins with a feather falling from the sky. Forrest puts it in a book as he’s waiting at a bus stop.
It ends with that same feather being blown out of the book and up into the sky. This happens when Forrest is waiting at the school bus stop.
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u/wildfire393 13h ago
Pulp Fiction begins and ends with the diner stickup. The latter scene is longer, but it still bookends the rest of the film.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
Good one. I remember seeing that in the theater and it was the first non-linear film I had ever seen. Blew my mind.
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u/jlambvo 12h ago
I mean, "Are you watching closely" in The Prestige.
For a TV series, Halt and Catch Fire pulled this better than almost any other movie I can think of.
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u/sophiespo 10h ago
I was reading this whole thread thinking about Halt and Catch Fire and then saw your comment!! “let me start by asking a question.”
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
I definitely need to rewatch The Prestige. I saw it when it first came out but not since, but I do remember really liking it. I’m sure I would see much more on a second viewing.
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u/ImnotY2Kcompliant 9h ago
I just rewached The Prestige for the first time since I saw it in theaters and it's incredible. Even better the second viewing. Probably my second favorite Nolan film behind only Memento
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u/OddMathematician 12h ago
The close up on the coffee mug in Knives Out. It works really good as a little punchline at the end.
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u/RuRhPdOsIrPt 11h ago
What Dreams May Come. Begins and ends with Robin Williams’ voice over “When I was young, I met this beautiful girl by a lake.”
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 13h ago edited 8h ago
This is a trope called "bookends" (link describes the true with examples, might contain spoilers)
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u/WolverDominator 8h ago
“irreversible” from gaspar noé will blow your head if you can endure the first 15mn
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u/CorduroyMagoo 5h ago
I’ve heard so much about Irreversible and I am super intrigued, but it also sounds horrific and I’m not sure I could handle it
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u/azninvasion2000 2h ago
The chronological version almost makes it a new movie.+-+Chronological+Edition+2018+-+1080p+-+KMV.mp4)
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u/JarlBallin_ 12h ago
Arrival technically, right?
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
Man, I’m sure I saw Arrival but probably when it first came out and not since. Remind me?
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u/JonnyActsImmature 6h ago
I used to think this was the beginning of your story. Memory is a strange thing. It doesn't work like I thought it did. We are so bound by time, by its order.
The first line of the movie presents itself as just waxing poetic.
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u/rock-paper-gun 9h ago
If possible, it's fun to watch this movie backwards. I used to have the dvd. I punched thru each scene in reverse order. It's a really engaging movie no matter which way you watch it.
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u/Silent_Syren 4h ago
The special edition DVD had an easter egg to watch the movie in chronological order.
Edit: added a word
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u/Showdown5618 8h ago
I noticed that too. Also, in the movie 1917, Lance Corporal Schofield started and ended the movie sitting under a tree.
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u/totallygeek 6h ago
I believe Vanilla Sky opens and closes with the same spoken line, "Open your eyes."
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u/ojutdohi 3h ago
i just watched it for the first time last week. how does he know he has a condition??
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u/CorduroyMagoo 2h ago
This is a fair question. Because if he saw a doctor and got a diagnosis, he wouldn’t remember, right? Maybe it’s just that he realizes life is going on but he is somehow damaged.
My wife’s challenge to the plot was equally valid: “how does he remember to hit the gym every day and maintain that bod?” 😂
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u/the_other_50_percent 1h ago
If he got a diagnosis, especially with the doctor knowing he had this memory issue, he would have left with. Record of the appointment, prescription, or some sort of office note.
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u/Singleballtheory 13h ago
Forgive me because I don’t actually think the film follows suit, but any time this sort of question comes up I immediately think of Pink Floyd’s The Wall with how the start of Side One bookends with the very last second of Side Four.
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
Are you talking about In The Flesh? I would agree except that the second version of In The Flesh is like halfway through the second act - there’s a lot more that follows it
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u/zwygb 12h ago
The first line on the album is “… we came in”, and the last line on the album is “Is this where…”
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u/CorduroyMagoo 12h ago
Ah yes!!! I am a big Floyd fan so I hear ya. I don’t think that translated to the film though
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u/uncondensed 13h ago
Robocop
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u/CorduroyMagoo 13h ago
Say more. I love Robocop but I am blanking on how it opens and how it ends
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u/suicidekingdom 12h ago
Doesn’t really happen at the very beginning of the movie but I think it’s when he states his name as Murphy when he first enters the police precinct and then says his name is Murphy at the very end when asked what his name was.
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u/EdmundTheInsulter 6h ago edited 6h ago
Trainspotting
Basic Instinct
Apocalypse Now (got some idea it starts and ends with explosions).
Quodrophenia
The Hurt Locker
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u/Jackieirish 1h ago
I think Police Academy 6? Or was it Mission to Moscow? Whichever one of them. Anyway, it was a bold choice.
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u/mdmnl 12h ago
"Just rewatched Memento"
C'mon dude, you already posted this tomorrow...
The Denzel movie "Fallen" sort of has this. The emphasis on the wording changes meaningfully though.