Pain and trauma permeate Michel Franco's new drama, “Memory,” about two lost souls who find surprising comfort in each other. Jessica Chastain's Sylvia and Peter Sarsgaard's Saul are both hostages of their own minds, albeit in very different ways. Hers haunts her. His fails quickly. And neither are entirely trustworthy.
“Memory,” released nationally Friday, begins like a seemingly standard “hurt person” movie, featuring Chastain’s Sylvia celebrating 12 years of sobriety at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting that her 12-year-old child attends with She. But this dramatic mystery is multi-faceted, compounded by unreliable narrators and moral gray areas. Before you know it, the film goes from something familiar to something entirely unexpected.
Although it's not easy to categorize, “Memory” is a thoughtful journey featuring strong performances from Chastain and Sarsgaard, who was recognized with the Best Actor award at the Venice Film Festival this fall. last. While there are moments of levity to break up the angst, it could also come with a long list of trigger warnings as it explores difficult topics ranging from sexual abuse to mental illness in quite a way unsatisfactory. Maybe it's a good thing the holidays are over, because it's not a time to watch with family, especially if they're hiding secrets of their own that have turned into generational trauma.
The film first connects you with Sylvia, a social worker and single mother who is suspicious of everything and everyone. She always seems ready to run away to get to safety and survive. She lives by a strict routine: walking her daughter, Anna (Brooke Timber), to school, going to work at an adult daycare, and attending her AA meetings. Home is a fortress: as soon as she enters her impoverished apartment, she locks her triple-lock door and dials the security code to arm the place.
Even though she doesn't know her well, it's surprising that her younger sister Olivia (Merritt Wever) is able to convince her to attend a high school reunion-type event early in the film. The decision seems even more unfathomable when we learn additional details about Sylvia's school years, but it is clear that she is uncomfortable and unhappy about the event, which she soon leaves.
For a moment, you wonder if her fears and anxieties are justified when she realizes that night that a man is following her home, first on the street, then in the same subway car, then in the same place, right up to his door. . It's like a nightmare as she searches for her keys. You held your breath until she was inside. A few hours later, the man is still there outside, watching her. Is it imagined? A dream? An ex ? A stranger?
The man in question is Saul, who she discovers is suffering from early-onset dementia. He won't remember that he followed her home or why, but he will remember her for some reason. Her brother, Isaac (Josh Charles), asks if Sylvia would like to work for them as Saul's companion.
And Saul and Sylvia develop a deep bond between them that goes beyond the guard's professional boundaries. Both are damaged and longing for connection and their friendship is like a balm, until it evolves into something else. Without going into too much detail, this relationship presents an ethical dilemma that the film doesn't seem to want to address in any serious way, making “Memory” feel underdeveloped at best. At worst, he's not even sure what he's trying to say. This movie has one of those endings that presents itself as happy but leaves you with a lingering feeling of dread and worry for everyone involved.
Films can be empathy machines and also a form of therapy, giving audiences permission to put themselves in a stranger's shoes and feel things that might otherwise seem too difficult, too transgressive, too much.
Sarsgaard does an excellent job playing this man who has been dealt a terrible card, whose body still functions but whose mind cannot be trusted. She's not the only one: Sylvia also has imperfect memories, as do members of her family, like her compartmentalized mother played brilliantly by Jessica Harper. All this turns into misery, secrets and shame.
Memory can be imperfect, this film reminds us, but feelings rarely are.
“Memory,” a Ketchup Entertainment release in limited theaters and expanding nationwide on Jan. 5, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association for “graphic nudity, some sexual content and language.” . Duration: 110 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.