Memento
By Jessica Scott
The first thing you notice about the website for the upcoming film
is that the name of the film is spelled backwards in the address.
This is a pretty clever way of introducing the main gimmick behind
the film.
If you are not familiar with the premise of the film, it is a murder
mystery using an interesting plot device: the story is told backwards.
The reason it is done so is because the main character is inflicted
with amnesia, so the story unfolds as he remembers it.
The main part of the site is a very well done flash applet. The front
part of this applet is what looks like a newspaper clipping. The headline
reads, "Photograph Sparks Murder Investigation." The article
tells of the discovery of several incriminating photographs in a motel
room. The man staying the room was Leonard Shelby. It looks like a
normal article, but if you look closely, a few selected words fade
to white and back again continuously. These are words like body, foul
and Leonard. If you move your mouse over these words the rest of the
article disappears, leaving only that word on the screen. If you click
on it, it moves to the center of the screen, and you are presented
with some "evidence".
The clues you are given about the murders include the pictures of
the bodies, police reports, paperwork from the hospital Leonard was
committed to, and, most interesting of all, notes from Leonard to
himself. He knows he will forget important details because of his
amnesia, so he writes several notes to himself to remind himself of
important facts.
I thought the site was very well put together and the story it tried
to tell was interesting. I enjoyed the style of narrative, which was
completely non-linear. It definitely got me interested in going out
and actually seeing the film, which is of course the purpose of this
site in the first place.