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Memento
Newmarket Capital Group

Memento reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 80 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
9.2 out of 10
based on 34 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 114 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for violence, language and some drug content

Starring Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano, Mark Boone Junior, Stephen Tobolowsky, and Harriet Sansom Harris

Dismissed by the police, Leonard Shelby (Pearce) is obsessed with pursuing vengeance for the rape and murder of his wife. The difficulty of his quest is compounded by his rare, untreatable form of memory loss.


GENRE(S): Suspense/Thriller  
WRITTEN BY: Christopher Nolan
Jonathan Nolan (story)
 
DIRECTED BY: Christopher Nolan  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: September 4, 2001 
Video: September 4, 2001 
Theatrical: March 16, 2001 
RUNNING TIME: 120 minutes, B/W / Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

Christopher Nolan's screenplay received Oscar, Golden Globe, AFI and Spirit Award nominations in 2001-02. Named Best Picture of 2001 by the Toronto Film Critics Association and the Online Film Critics Society (tie with Mulholland Drive).

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100
Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
A delicious one-time treat.
Read Full Review
100
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Pearce, who's in every scene except the Sammy flashbacks, dominates the picture through his feral performance.
Read Full Review
100
Newsweek Jeff Giles
A gripping, utterly unexpected noir, glinting with bits of poetry and a hard, deadpan humor.
100
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Memento, which may be the ultimate existential thriller, has a spooky repetitive urgency that takes on the clarity of a dream.
Read Full Review
100
New York Daily News Jack Mathews
One of the most original and ultimately confounding mind games to reach the screen since "The Usual Suspects."
Read Full Review
91
Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
A hard and bright and tough film in all the best ways.
90
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Enthralling or infuriating.
Read Full Review
90
Variety Lisa Nesselson
Deconstructs time and space with Einstein-caliber dexterity in the service of a delectably disturbing tale of revenge.
Read Full Review
90
Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
A provocatively structured and thrillingly executed film noir, an intricate, inventive use of cinema's possibilities that pushes what can be done on screen in an unusual direction.
Read Full Review
90
Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
Operates in an orbit somewhere between Oliver Sacks and Lewis Carroll. I can't remember when a movie has seemed so clever, strangely affecting and slyly funny at the very same time.
90
Village Voice J. Hoberman
The video stores are filled with examples of retro-noir and neo-noir, but Christopher Nolan's audacious timebender is something else. Call it meta-noir.
Read Full Review
90
The New York Times Dana Stevens
A brilliant feat of rug-pulling, sure to delight fans of movies like "The Usual Suspects" and "Pi."
Read Full Review
90
Washington Post Desson Thomson
You're exhilarated from beginning to end.
Read Full Review
90
Washington Post Rita Kempley
Unforgettable, especially in Pearce's startling performance.
Read Full Review
90
Rolling Stone Peter Travers
Like the best filmmakers at Sundance 2001, Nolan leaps into the wild blue and dares us to leap with him. Go for it.
Read Full Review
88
USA Today Mike Clark
Has the unanticipated craft and artfully ambiguous appeal of last year's "Croupier," a movie whose art-house word-of-mouth success could be duplicated here.
Read Full Review
88
New York Post Lou Lumenick
This demanding puzzle is not for the "Chocolat" crowd, but those who stay with it will experience perhaps the most dazzling film released so far this year - even though a second viewing is virtually mandatory.
88
Boston Globe Jay Carr
The most disorienting and trippiest data-retrieval caper in years.
88
Chicago Tribune Mark Caro
A puzzle movie in which the puzzle is actually worth the time and effort to solve.
Read Full Review
88
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
Terrifically satisfying film.
80
LA Weekly Ella Taylor
If nothing else, Memento is a savvy comment on the queasy uncertainties of the postmodern condition, in which history goes no further back than yesterday's news, and knowledge is supplanted by "information" from a tumult of spin-controlled, unreliable narrators.
Read Full Review
80
Mr. Showbiz Kevin Maynard
Nolan's engrossing, backwards-ticking noir will run you so thoroughly in circles that you'll need to see it at least twice for maximum enjoyment.
80
Film.com Peter Brunette
Despite the first-rate acting, the narrative is the star of this show, so much so that you feel yourself occasionally losing interest in the travails of the characters. Instead, you hang on every word and every tiny object, every cut and bruise in the frame, looking for clues that will help you make sense of what's going on.
Read Full Review
80
New York Magazine Peter Rainer
Nolan sustains an arty note of existential dread that probably will work better for noir-steeped film critics and overserious philosophy grad students than for general audiences, but he brings off a few brisk bravura moments.
Read Full Review
75
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
A diabolical and absorbing experience.
Read Full Review
75
Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
This unconventionally structured thriller moves at an energetic pace, spurred by a string of clever variations on conventional film narrative.
Read Full Review
75
Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Fiendishly tricky contraption.
75
San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann
Bound to be talked about, debated and eviscerated far more than it's understood.
Read Full Review
70
Time Richard Schickel
The film takes this attempt to shatter narrative into little pieces about as far into incoherence as it can go; yet it is also full of odd, hypnotic menace.
70
Slate David Edelstein
It's scary to have to puzzle out a plot line scene by scene -- scary and exhilarating, at least for an hour.
Read Full Review
50
Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf
Feels mostly like an audacious prank.
Read Full Review
40
Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
Once you've seen it all once I bet you'll wish you were watching "Groundhog Day" -- again.
Read Full Review
40
Salon.com Charles Taylor
Whenever Harris or Tobolowsky come on-screen they stop Memento dead in its clever tracks. You want to tell Nolan to stop all the po-mo deconstructive game playing and pay attention to the two human beings in front of him.
Read Full Review
38
Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
The dramatic content in Memento is as blank as Leonard's post-traumatic mental state.

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 9.2 (out of 10) based on 114 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

[Anonymous] gave it a10:
Amazing movie. Acting was incredible and Nolan's directing was very beautiful in a way.

J gave it a10:
A great thriller with a very cool existentialist subtext, especially at the end. I agree with Woob; you really need to see this movie at least twice to pick up all the foreshadowing clues (the superb editing hides these cleverly).

[Anonymous] gave it a5:
Okay film in every aspect. But contrary to the popular belief here, it is certainly not a must see or even exceptionally smart. I felt it to be very predictable and shallow. Its trying to confuse the viewer just to be artsy and different. Don't trust the reviewers on which movies you must see.

Woob gave it a10:
Uh....awesome. A great film with so many little foreshadowing details that you never notice the first time.

John V gave it a10:
Excellent Film. Carrie-Anne Moss was outstanding in this film.

Alex P. gave it a10:
A very smart movie that isn't for everyone. But those willing to follow it carefully are rewarded with excellent acting, great edting, and an overall interesting and humane story.

Patrick D. gave it a10:
Harry Potter got a better score than this.

Read more user comments...

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