Christopher Nolan's Memento: narrative structure and memory

Mento

Memento and Narrative Closure

On first glance, it is difficult to apply the adjective of "satisfying" on a level of expectations or of 'questions' to the filmic narrative of "Memento." Christopher Nolan's motion picture 'feels' open-ended as cinema. It is structurally in violation of the supposed commandments of filmmaking. At the beginning the reader is introduced to 'Teddy' and 'Lenny,' the latter of whom has no short-term memory, and lives in a quest to avenge his murdered wife. At the end of the film, he is still on his quest -- but only after killing Teddy because Teddy has revealed the uncomfortable truth that in fact it was Lenny who killed his wife, in anger after she transgressed because of her frustration with dealing with Lenny's mental incapacity.

The film evolves in a lurching back and forth fashion, mainly through flashbacks, but anchored by scenes of Teddy and Lenny, first depicted at the beginning of the film. Finally the two 'have it out' together at the film's end in a kind of dialogue version of a 'shoot out' that ends with Teddy's real demise. But how can such a narrative become 'closed' a viewer might ask, when the main character is still in a futile quest for his dead wife's killer? Lenny gives himself a continuing narrative reason to justify his existence, even if there is no real reason for doing so. The viewer knows more than the main character, but unlike in traditional film, the main character, because of his mental illness and the false nature of his quest, can attain no psychological epiphany of closure, and the viewer's expectation of the end of the quest is thwarted.

Agon," or conflict, is at the heart of most narratives, according to the literary theorist of narrative H. Porter Abbot. For instance, the 'agon' in the tale of Solomon and the two women contesting over the same baby is the question of which of the women -- both of whom are prostitutes -- is the true mother. Famously, in the Biblical age before genetic testing, the woman who refuses to allow the child to be split in half is deemed the true mother by the great Hebrew king and judge Solomon.

However, the resolution of the tale is not merely the answer of the question as to whom is the mother, according to Abbot's theory, but the transformation that allows the prostitute, by saying when Solomon offers to split the child in two, 'let her have the whole baby,' to become 'The Mother.' In other words, the prostitute exchanges one narrative archetype and character designation for another, and only does the narrative truly resolve the expectation of closure. The narrative of questions is satisfied in that the mystery is solved, but more importantly at the level of expectation the narrative is satisfied in the new psychological understanding achieved of the woman's character by herself, by Solomon, and by society. The whore is reborn as the mother. (Abbot, Chapter 12)

The real drama or contest thus is not whom of these faceless and nameless harlots are the mother of the nameless infant but the one woman's ability to redeem herself. Thus, in this sense "Memento" is unsatisfying in a narrative form. The convoluted nature of how the narrative unfolds suggests that the individuals who 'get' what happens at the end are satisfied through intellectual understanding of the questions posed by the clever structure of the movie. But on a deeper and more emotive sense, the movie eschews any connection with the central protagonist. The man's purported feelings for his dead wife are false -- Lenny really killed her. Lenny's quest is bloody and foolish, and to a certain extent defies psychological analysis or penetration because Lenny cannot remember why he acts as he does, he only feels. In a film of cerebral tricks, Lenny is incapable of any cerebral analysis of his own hair-trigger character.

Lenny exists from moment to moment, incapable not only of understanding other people, but also of understanding his own past or current state of psychological health. If there were another character to act as a template to provide this understanding throughout, as Solomon does for the motherly prostitute, this might have some significance and meaning for the viewer. To a certain extent the 'John G.' murderer who is not a murderer figure of Teddy does this at the end, but Teddy's penetrating presence is so transient it does not resolve things in a satisfactory fashion. Also, because Lenny is incapable, without the possession of memory, to achieve any psychological epiphany, the film is unsatisfying and lacks an emotional sense of closure.