"That's not your car!" 

"It is now."

Okay.... This movie. I loved this movie. I am madly in love with films that leave open endings and are strung with puzzles. I feel a lot of people are, I'm not if its the thrill of trying to solve the mystery or trying to find even the smallest flaw in the story you can. Which ever you like to do or both, Memento is possibly one of the greatest movies for this. It took me a bit to catch on to the way that they edited the film but once I caught on I was trying to piece everything together. The movie was a lot more fun to try and put together than the short story. The short was really basic, I was interested for a while reading it but it wasn't really captivating or confusing or hard to figure out. But with a short story, as we've discussed in class, its harder to leave really good details for riddles and a thorough story. But with an almost two hour film you can squeeze in a lot and you can really play with peoples minds. While the shorty was chopped up it still has a very linear feel to it. But with the film you feel like you're jumping back and forth constantly, and I feel like this is more disorienting because of imagery. Our minds are constantly trying to absorb new info in reverse and forward. While I was watching I thought of it like watching a VHS tape backwards. Popping in the tape at the end rewinding by 5 minutes playing to the end, rewind 10 minutes playing to 5 minutes, rewind 15 minutes play to 10, rinse and repeat. At first this is a little disorienting trying to figure out the SYSTEM. But soon enough we are CONDITIONED. 

The Great Debate

I feel like this will be much easier to put in writing. As I said in class, I believe Sammy and Leonard are two different people. Sammy the con man, Leonard the insurance inspector. But here's why I think that Leonard "is Sammy". The first thing we need to keep in mind is that Leonard has brain damage, wires can get crossed and memories mixed up. Leonard takes the story from his life when he was investigating Sammy's case which is already in his mind. His last memory is watching his wife "die". It is highly possible that he passed out looking at his wife tangled up in the curtain barely breathing. If that was your last memory of course you would think she was dead. The next thing we have to keep in mind is that Teddy really is a cop, regardless of whether or not he used Leonard, he seems trustworthy with his info but we are conditioned to distrust what he says due to how the film is made. But I think we should trust Teddy's word. So with all this info and a few nudges from the filmmakers with spliced shots I think we should believe that Leonard's wife survived and did in fact have diabetes and in Leonard's subconscious he placed Sammy in his place to deny the loss, pain, and truth about his wife. The mind is capable of extraordinary things even when it is damaged. As for "remember Sammy Jankis." I believe that was Leonard trying to remind himself who Sammy really was in order to try and separate the two and remember the "truth". But why bother going through all this explanation? You're just going to forget it all in 10 minutes anyway......

The Great Gatsby: The good, the bad, and the kind of okay...

The Great Gatsby(Novel)

First off let me just open with I did not like the book. I know, big gasps. While it is well written I want more story than a bunch of detail, you can give plenty of detail describing a landfill but its still full of garbage. Yes, detail is important but you can't lean an entire novel on it. To me the novel was a lot of bones and very little skin, i'll call it a zombie novel(don't ask). I'm aware he was trying to capture the generation he was in at the time with a love story on the side but he could've done a better job of mixing story and detail.

The Great Gatsby(1974)

Let me just throw this out there from the beginning, this is very bad. They follow the novel fairly well but it all just seems like a joke with the atrocious acting. Yes, standards have greatly improved since then but the Godfather didn't seem to have any trouble with finding good actors. I have to say that I agreed with every review that I read about this film. While it sticks with the novel, there are plenty of parts where they stray. As stated many times in class, Gatsby is too cool. They may as well cast a robot for him... or even all the actors. None of them seemed to have depth or dimension. Overall I would recommend just staying away from this film. Classic or not its not worth the two and a half hours that it takes away from your life. 

Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MstmidhHNQ

The Great Gatsby(2013)

Where the hell is Leo's oscar and did Jay-Z do music for this movie... I thoroughly enjoyed this film and I actually liked the characters and grew close to them, probably because they actually have emotions. This movie stuck with the book and had a very interesting take on the perspective in which it was to be told. It made me feel like a reader as much as a movie goer, though you'd probably have to have read the book first in order to get this feeling. Some people like to pick on Leo's accent in this movie but I thought he did a perfect job. He had that regal, over the top tone because that's not who Gatsby is, I saw it as him mocking all of the snobs he was surrounding himself with. Now on to the music, like many I think it was a huge mistake using pop music in this film. While everything does have a very polished and modern look to it, I feel that when you put pop music in a 1920's setting it takes away from the authenticity of the era. I don't want to hear something I can hear any time I turn on the radio, I would rather hear revamps of Jazz songs from that era. Though the one modern song I was fine with being in the movie was Lana Del Rey's "young and beautiful" because it had an older and more natural sound and fit the context of the film. 

Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaBVLhcHcc0