"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......