Memory (2022)

Memory (2022)

 

3/10

Starring

Liam Neeson

Guy Pearce

Monica Bellucci

 

Directed by Martin Campbell

 

This movie is a failed job. It should have been darker, more serious, and surrounded by actors who could match Liam Neeson, because the movie felt like he was acting alongside people with better things to do.

The movie is a remake of a Belgian film called The Alzheimer Case, which was based on the book De Zaak Alzheimer by Jef Geeraerts. When the hitman has dementia and Alzheimer’s, you’re left to wonder how things are going to play out. The movie is weird — there are some killings they don’t show, and then they show some. I don’t know if that’s due to a bad budget or just the editor of the movie on some funny drugs. The movie is so forgettable that if I don’t write this review now, I might forget I’ve even seen it. For the first time in a while, Liam Neeson is playing a character that fits his age. He’s a hitman getting too old and finding it difficult to remember things. There aren’t too many crazy stunts where we see him do some horrible hand-to-hand combat like in some of the other movies. This one just has him shooting at people. The plot is a good one, but the execution is horrible, and the screenplay is just a joke. I would advise anyone with anything better to do to avoid this movie.

The overall plot is this: Alex (Liam Neeson) is a hitman hired to kill two people. The first one is a man who gives him a drive containing video recordings of popular men sleeping with a minor. He kills the man and collects the drive easily. The second person he was supposed to kill is the minor from the video. Alex refuses to carry out that task and threatens the man who hired him to call off the kill. He wakes up the next day to find out that the girl has been killed. At first, he doubts himself because of his dementia, wondering if he had done it, but after asking the person he was with, he discovers he didn’t. He knows they’re coming for him, so he runs off and calls the FBI agent in charge of getting the girl to cooperate, Vincent (Guy Pearce). He tells Vincent all he knows about the case and informs him that he plans to kill the people involved. The movie is about Vincent trying to get to the bottom of the case while stopping Alex from committing murder, all while Alex is slowly losing his grip on reality.

The movie is a failed attempt at doing something good with a story that had many possibilities. So many things don’t make sense — like how some people know each other, how easy it is to reach the FBI and an agent if you want, and how foolish the police can be (a man steps out of the car unarmed, and he’s gunned down). Many things about this movie are recycled nonsense that are best forgotten.