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Film Form and Mnemonic Devices in Memento 105These shots, placed at the beginning and at the end of the film, are recognizablefor their similarities, even if they change from color to black andwhite, and again to color. They are filmed in the same way and this qualitygives rise to a comparison between the different moments of the story.The final shot, which is close to the end of the film, shows Leonard leavingTeddy, going in a direction that we know is senseless. We dare say theentire film can be understood in this shot. What lasts in the original versionis a sense of uncertainty, conveyed by the open-ended conclusion ofthis sequence. The difference with the chronological version is striking,because as the arrangement follows the chronological order, the sequenceis different: 3, 4, 5, 1, 2. We only see the characters’ movements from andto the derelict building: the first time Leonard enters the area, then he goesout driving Jimmy’s Jaguar, and finally he drives Teddy to the building beforekilling him. With this arrangement, the effect created in the original versionis lost: the significance of the directions of movement is missing, thesense of the actions is misplaced.Final ConsiderationsMemento is a complex film about memory and oblivion, about timeelapsed, and about remembering. It tells the story of a “ten minute guy,”who would be unable, as Sammy Jankis was, to remember an entire film.The viewer is invited to use his or her cognitive and memorial skills to comprehendwhat the main character is unable to master. If Leonard lacks thepossibility of seeing the situation of his current life in its totality, the viewercan take this wide-range look.The whole film is immersed in the past, and we can say that it is entirelybased upon a memorial dimension, structured and reconstructed on thebasis of the viewer’s memory of selected images. In fact the most advancedpoint in time is not an action, but an image: the Polaroid photograph takento document the past, after Teddy’s death. We can see no future events, nosuccessive actions from this point. If we want to know something moreabout the causes of the killing, we have to turn back in time. So memory isat stake, as well as the lack of memory. While watching the film, we can “feel”our own capabilities, because the main character lacks his own. Memento,like other contemporary films, offers the opportunity of considering thisparticular form of aesthetic response: we can study the viewer’s experienceof his or her mental absorption in a complex film, and the ensuing effects.