the m0vie blog

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with special guests Phil Bagnall and Kurt North, The 250 is a weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released Saturdays at 6pm GMT.

This week, Christopher Nolan’s Memento.

Suffering from a unique of amnesia, a man called Leonard lacks the ability to generate new long-term memories. Haunted by the death of his wife, Leonard has committed himself to finding the man responsible for her murder. However, Leonard finds himself in the midst of various competing agendas, unsure what he is doing from minute-to-minute. What is Leonard really doing? Who can Leonard truly trust?

At time of recording, it was ranked 57th on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Show Notes:

• Recorded 13th October 2020.
• Note: Due to the COVID-19 situation, this episode was recorded remotely. We suspect, going forward that a lot of our episodes will be until the crisis resolves.
• Memento at the Internet Movie Database.
• The IMDb 250 at time of recording.
• Follow Kurt on Twitter.
• Listen to Kurt on The Time is Now.
• Listen to Kurt on Pick Up a Podcast.
• Listen to Kurt on The Magic Box Podcast.
• Follow Phil on Twitter.
• Read Phil’s reviews at Scannain.
• Emine Sinmaz at The Guardian reports on the clearing of Kevin Spacey following allegations of sexual assault, July 2023.
• Mary McNamara at The Los Angeles Times considers what Kevin Spacey’s acquittal means, July 2023.
• Jennifer Zahn at Vulture offers a timeline of the allegations of sexual assault against Ansel Elgort, April 2022.
• Christopher Nolan talks to The Guardian about his difficulty advancing in the British film industry following the success of Following, June 2005.
• Christopher Nolan talks to The Guardian about moving from Britain to America to make Memento, November 1999.
• Memento Mori, Esquire, 2001.
• Jonathan and Christopher Nolan talk to Filmmaker Magazine about the origins of Memento, Winter 2001.
• Bria McNeal at Esquire reports on Christopher Nolan’s account of getting “dragged” during a Pelaton class, January 2024.
• Matt Donnelly at Variety reports on Christopher Nolan’s reaction to the controversy over his comments about Pelaton, January 2024.
• Nate Jones at Vulture offers a list of interesting facts about Christopher Nolan and tea, October 2014.
• Robbie Collins at The Telegraph considers the relationship between Christopher Nolan and Emma Thomas, February 2024.
• David Sims at The Atlantic offers an account of the importance and development of Memento, March 2016.
• Hoai-Tran Bui at Inverse considers the unlikely path that Memento had to its release, January 2024.
• Brian Raftery at The Ringer considers the explosion of “tech noir” films at the turn of the millennium, October 2021.
• Randy Laist writes at Alphaville about the influence of Jean Baudrillard on turn of the millennium cinema and pop culture, 2011.
• Daniel Dimanna at ScreenRant discusses the home media releases of Memento that play the movie in a linear manner, August 2021.
• Larry Cohen at The Los Angeles Times offers an account of Michael Bay’s reaction to the pitch for Phone Booth, March 2003.
• Pete Best talks to The Irish Times about being fired from the Beatles, March 2020.
• Larry Booth at Plaintiff Magazine considers the unreliability of eye-witness testimony, September 2011.
• Sandra Guerra Thompson at The New York Times argues that eye-witness testimony is fundamentally unreliable, August 2011.
• Ed Yong writes at National Geographic about how the very act of remembering a memory can rewrite it, May 2013.
• Nancy Shute at NPR discusses how our memories of past events are coloured by our present emotions, February 2014.
• Christopher Nolan talks to Vulture about how important Memento was to his development as an artist, April 2015.
• Scott Bowles at USA Today gets “inside the mind of Christopher Nolan”, October 2006.
• Christopher Hooton at The Independent reflects on Nolan’s comments about the ambiguity of Inception, June 2015.
• Zack Sharf at Variety reports on Nolan’s comments regarding the ending of Inception, July 2023.
• Jeremy Kirk at Film School Rejects offers an account of the multiple endings to the Memento commentary, August 2011.
• Darren Mooney at The Escapist considers how Christopher Nolan became an internet villain, December 2020.
• Christopher Nolan talks to Directors’ Guild of America Quarterly about his feelings regarding 3D, Spring 2012.
• Bilge Ebiri writes at Vulture about Nolan’s embrace of IMAX film, February 2024.
• Darren Mooney at The Escapist writes about TENET as a movie about the need to believe in more than material reality, May 2021.
• Julie Millay at The Artifice considers the influence of John Locke on Memento, September 2017.
• Thomas Wartenberg at Philosophy Now considers the philosophy of Memento, 2001.
• Tamer Jeffers & George Cairn review Memento in Tamara: Journal of Critical Postmodern Organization Science, 2001.
• Charles Thorp at Men’s Journal considers Guy Pearce as “one of the fittest guys in Hollywood”, December 2017.
• Guy Pearce writes a letter to his younger self in The Big Issue, July 2022.
• Thomas Lennon talks to The Huffington Post about appearing in both Memento and The Dark Knight Rises, July 2012.
• Jeremy Gordon at MTV reports on rumours that Guy Pearce was considered to play Ra’s Al Ghul in Batman Begins, April 2012.
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Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: carrie ann moss, Christopher Nolan, end of history, film, Guy Pearce, history, imdb, joe pantoliano, kurt north, leonard, los angeles, memento, memory, neo-noir, Nevada, phil bagnall, podcast, the matrix, unreality |