MEMENTO of Ghajini

“The world doesn’t just disappear when you close your eyes, isn’t it?” Leonard Shelby said. These words were spoken by the main character of the movie, MEMENTO, at the beginning of the movie. It smacked my senses. But as it progresses, it smacked me more and I just thought that what I thought was the beginning part of the movie was almost in the middle part of the story as a whole.



Memento is a Christopher Nolan film in 2000. It is a psychological thriller, both written and directed by Nolan. It is about a man with anterograde amnesia which impairs the ability of one’s mind to keep new explicit memories, in search for the guy who raped and killed his wife. It stars Guy Pearce, as Leonard Shelby, the one who suffers memory loss. Carrie –Anne Moss as Natalie, who gives him things he needs to know. And Joe Pantoliano as Teddy, the one he kills at the opening of the movie.

As aforementioned, the opening credits of the movie reminded me of one of my favorite movies, Ghajini. It is a Hindi romantic action drama film written and directed by A. R. Murugadoss and produced by Tagore Madhu and Madhu Mantena in 2008. It is somehow similar to this movie, since the main character, Sanjay, played by the famous Aamir Khan, revenges for his killed girlfriend, Kalpana played by the prettiest Hindi actress I have ever seen, Asin Thottumkal.

Elements in the movie such as a Polaroid Instant Camera which photos serve as remembrance of everything they need to commit to memory as well as permanent tattoos on his body were present in both movies. But there are still a lot of differences as to how the story was presented, the characters playing and the point of revenge, a wife in Memento and a girlfriend in Ghajini. Both were all for the name of love. There were rumors that the Bollywood movie was a mere remake of the one in Hollywood 8 years ago, but Aamir Khan says the movie is just inspired from the Hollywood flick and is not a copy or remake of it.


It took me a while to watch that movie several times backwards and forwards to end up eventually not understanding it. After finishing it, I can’t help but contrast it with Ghajini. I can’t honestly get what Memento is all about because I thought of it as a highly-intellectual movie in some way. After all, I can still say that Ghajini is better. The story and the plot appears more clear to me. And I was really swept away by the movie. After watching it, scenes in the movie are still playing on my mind. It has inflicted an impact to me, and I love it.