«Will »Reminiscence" leave a mark?

Cinema Wednesdays - Kelly Lambiel

A city ravaged by water and a curious memory machine. A tortured protagonist and a mysterious femme fatale. Science fiction or film noir? For her first feature-length film, between the nostalgia of the old detective stories she's particularly fond of and the futuristic atmosphere that made her famous through the series Westworld, Lisa Joy makes no bones about it. Even if the image is particularly well-polished and the combination of genres surprising, the plot of Reminiscence turns out to be neither wholly ordinary nor wholly original.

Due to global warming, which has caused devastating floods and sparked a turf war, Miami has turned into a dangerous place. When the underworld isn’t controlling the city, it’s the turn of the «barons»—no less criminal, but far wealthier—to pull the strings. In this bleak future where crime, drugs, and survival reign supreme, people take refuge in the past to go on living. Thanks to a device that can revive and project memories, it becomes possible, for a few minutes at a time, to rediscover long-lost sensations and relive forgotten moments as if they were real.

Through this arrangement, Nick Bannister (Hugh Jackman) and his partner Watts (Thandiwe Newton)—two somewhat battered former soldiers—regularly collaborate with the police on sordid investigations. But they also offer their services to individuals who wish to find refuge in the recesses of their memory. Everything changes the day Mae (Rebecca Ferguson) disappears, a few months after coming to their office in search of her keys. We then learn that Nick, whose voice-over He guides us throughout the film, madly in love with her, obsessed with her, searching for her desperately—but in vain—until the day his investigation leads him down a new path.

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Let's be honest—whether we know a little bit about them or not, thrillers In the most classic stories, it’s pretty easy to see where things are headed. It’s easy to imagine—and without straying too far from reality—that the enigmatic and sensual cabaret singer isn’t a bad person at heart but has found herself, somewhat against her will, caught up in some shady business. And that the broken-down, pseudo-detective—who doesn’t take care of himself—will go so far as to sacrifice himself to save her. Without realizing that his alcoholic best friend, a former comrade-in-arms, has always been watching his back. And all for her sake. Even if the characters from the black are often archetypes; a more nuanced portrayal of their psychology would have been welcome.

So that’s the first drawback, but unfortunately not the only one. Not only are there no (or very few) surprises, but—more importantly—the further the film progresses, the more it loses credibility. Memories are, in fact, experienced—depending on narrative needs—either in the third person or the first person. This choice certainly maintains some suspense and helps move the story forward, but at the same time undermines the entire credibility of the mechanism on which the plot rests. The problem? At times, the projected images include details that the person recalling them could not have conceived, and at other times, they withhold this information from the viewer under the pretext of not revealing all the pieces of the puzzle.

On top of this clumsiness, there is one final blunder concerning the aesthetic and ideological decisions surrounding the production. While I commend the quality of the cinematography—the scenes are beautiful and well-shot, the sets are realistic and well-crafted, the special effects are masterfully executed, and, according to experts, quite innovative— the decision to use this post-apocalyptic setting merely as a stylistic device—not as a substantive element but as a formal one—is regrettable. While science fiction generally invites reflection and aims to convey ideas, the transposition into this futuristic universe ultimately does little to make the viewer question their relationship to memory, the past, or the present. Here, it serves only as entertainment.

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Photo credits: © Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.