REVIEW: MEMORY

4/5

Memory Serves

99 Mins. Starring: Jessica Chastain, Peter Sarsgaard, Merritt Wever, Brooke Timber, Elsie Fisher, Josh Charles & Jessica Harper. Screenplay: Michel Franco. Director: Michel Franco. In: Theatres.

Academy season may almost be an afterthought now. Moving on in this day and age as quickly as the red carpet is rolled up. But let's spare a thought for the winners of 2022. I'm not trying to, and I won't use a slapping pun, take shots at the winner of 'Best Actor', and one of my favourites who clearly made a mistake he has mostly been forgiven for. But the moment that was heard around the world sure did take the spotlight off of other actors and their shine. Namely, 'The Eyes Of Tammy Faye' 'Best Actress', Jessica Chastain, who finally got a well deserved Oscar after amazing work in 'Zero Dark Thirty', 'The Help', 'The Tree Of Life', 'A Most Violent Year', 'Miss Sloane', 'Molly's Game', and much, much more, including 'Scenes From A Marriage' on television, with reuniting co-star and fellow Juilliard grad, Oscar Isaac. It could also be COVID's fault. Since the overshadowed Oscar, she's starred in 'The 355' team-up, Netflix's 'The Good Nurse' and 'Mother's Instinct' with Anne Hathaway, which completely passed me by. Are these things on Peacock?

'Memory' serves as a reminder to all this. It's been out in Japan for a few weeks now, but this Michel Franco movie debuted in 2023. That's usually the order of non-big blockbuster and Marvel movies here, but with that being said, it's been so long, the new cinematic collaborative coupling of Chastain and Franco (not related to Dave or James) have a new movie out called 'Dreams', where Jessica plays Jennifer McCarthy (no...not that one...I think). This one, on the other hand, doesn't deal with what we think about in our R.E.M., but what we regard in our past lives. The Franco ('After Lucia') film concerns a single mother and sober social worker unpacking her past, as she locks up her house with her electronic alarm. All whilst caring for a man with early onset dementia she met after he followed her home from a high-school reunion. Stalking. Sexual assault. There's a lot to deal with in this movie that sees their troubled pasts twist and turn to an even more perplexing present that threatens to fracture the forlorn foundations that they have worked so hard to build. Nothing is easy in this movie that earns every emotion. Chastain is compelling, as always, but this might just be one of her finest, albeit sadly forgotten, films.

A moment of misunderstanding makes this movie even harder to take, when a conversation in a peaceful and beautiful park turns brutal and then cruel. Yet, like life, through all its love and hate, and patience and pain, finds another path home. The great Peter Sarsgaard (who acts his pants off in everything from his Academy Award nominated 'Shattered Glass', to his brief, explosive turn in 'The Batman') plays the man in question in 'Memory'. And you won't soon forget his powerful performance, layered with likeable qualities and quirks, even if Oscar did. The Golden Lion of the 80th Venice International Film Festival certainly didn't. And Sarsaard took home the Volpi Cup for Best Actor. And he should hold it high, like his character's head. Elsewhere, 'Birdman' and 'Marriage Story' star Merritt Wever could have taken home another award, while Brooke Timber plants roots as a face to watch in the future. 'Eighth Grade's' Elsie Fisher and Josh Charles of 'Dead Poets Society' come up aces with concerned and conflicted performances, and it gets even more legendary with Jessica Harper. All this should make this movie committed to memory. However, the dark themes of drink, drugs, depression and dementia may make people want to think about something else. Yet, 'Memory' is still something you can't take your mind's eye off of. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Further Filming: 'Still Alice', 'Love & Other Drugs', 'Mother's Instinct'.