Memento

1. Why did the director choose to edit the film the way he did?
- I believe the director chose to edit the film the way he did because that way it would be more interesting for the viewer. Although the beginning was a little strange and kind of hard to pick up, once you started to understand the dynamics of the movie it was fun and exciting to watch every twist the movie took. I also believe he edited the film the way he did so that the people watching would have to pay attention to the whole movie to be able to understand it.

2. Why did the director change from color to black and white? Do you think it was necessary? Interesting? What did it add/subtract from the film?
-I believe the director changed the color from black to white to put an emphasis on the phone conversations. It also seemed to be that when the movie went to black and white, it was like a flashback into the movie. Throughout the whole movie the audience is wondering who he is talking to and how this is going to change the dynamic of the movie. When you finally find out that it was a detective calling him you realize that it was probably unnecessary for it to be in black and white. I thought it was an interesting way to emphasize certain parts but was in the end unnecessary. It added emphasis on certain parts but lost relevancy by not being a large part of the outcome.

3. What was the relevance of Sammy Jankis?
-Sammy Jankis throughout most of the movie is a man that Leonard came in contact with through his career as an insurance investigator. Sammy is a name that is suffering from short term memory loss; a condition in which he cannot register new memories in his brain. Memories such as people’s names, his name, or the place he lives. In the beginning and throughout most of the movie, the audience believes that he is real and the through an injury Leonard is suffering from the same condition. In the end we find out that Sammy Jankis has been made up and is just a name Leonard bases his life off of.

4. What is your theory about what happened at the end (which was really the beginning) of the movie?
-My theory about what happened at the end of the movie is that Leonard actually knew what he was doing the whole time. He was acting like he suffered from the same memory illness as Sammy Jankis so that he may kill people. I believe that Leonard intentionally killed his wife by giving her to much insulin and knew what he was doing the whole time. This is a very twisted movie that takes a lot of unexpected turns and is kind of hard to follow, but if one is able to follow the whole movie it actually is pretty well written.

The things I noticed about this movie is that the beginning of the movie is hard to follow but once you recognize the system it follows it is fun and exciting to watch. I also noticed that the director cuts the film to black and white at points to put an emphasis on certain parts of the movie; later in the movie you realize it is kind of unnecessary but is still interesting. The movie is also backwards and has the beginning at the end and the end at the beginning. By choosing this method I feel that the director makes the movie more interesting and forces the audience to pay attention to the whole movie and try to piece everything together. The questions that still remain for me are as follows: Did Leonard actually know what he was doing? Was Sammy Jankis actually a real person? And if Leonard actually suffered from this short term memory loss why was he not in a group home like Sammy Jankis? The parts of the movie that made it interesting was how you had to piece everything together to understand what was going on throughout the movie. It was also very interesting how Leonard used tattoos on his body to remind himself of certain things he couldn’t remember. It was also interesting how he used pictures of people to remember them and how he wrote certain things on the back of them to remember things about them. The ending put a very good emotional twist on the movie because you go from feeling bad for Leonard because people are taking advantage of him, but then it suggests that he knew what was going on the whole time so you feel like you felt bad for no reason. Overall this movie is a good thriller and takes a lot of interest twists.