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“I’m Bad in That”: Guy Pearce Reflects on His Performance in Memento

Written and directed by Nolan, Memento follows Leonard, a man battling short-term memory loss while trying to find the man who murdered his wife.

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“I’m Bad in That”: Guy Pearce Reflects on His Performance in Memento

Oscar nominee Guy Pearce has admitted that he disliked his performance in Christopher Nolan’s 2000 film Memento, where he portrayed the memory-challenged Leonard Shelby, as reported by Deadline.

Pearce, who has earned a nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Adrien Brody’s The Brutalist at the upcoming Academy Awards, compared his performance in Memento to “Nails on a Chalkboard,” revealing his disappointment with his work in the film.

“I’m having an existential crisis. I watched Memento the other day and I’m still depressed. I’m bad in that movie. I’d never thought that before, but I did this Q&A of Memento earlier this month and decided to actually watch the film again. But while it was playing I realized I hate what I did,” Pearce told Times, as quoted by Deadline.

Reflecting on his portrayal, Pearce explained, “I was trying to do a flippant attitude, but it was all wrong. John Gielgud once said, ‘You can be good in a good movie, good in a bad movie, bad in a bad movie, but never be bad in a good movie.’ Yet I watched Memento and realized I’m bad in a good movie.”

There was considerable fan speculation regarding Pearce’s absence from the Academy Awards nominations after the release of Memento in 2000. However, two decades later, the actor feels the jury made the right decision. “It’s funny; people say I should’ve been nominated for Memento. Now I understand why I wasn’t,” said Pearce.

Written and directed by Nolan, Memento follows Leonard, a man battling short-term memory loss while trying to find the man who murdered his wife. The film also featured Carrie-Anne Moss and Joe Pantoliano.

Pearce recently shared his experiences working with big-budget Hollywood films and why he decided to distance himself from them. After the success of Memento, major Hollywood studios approached him for high-budget films, including The Time Machine, which, despite its premise based on H.G. Wells’ novel, was a major flop.

Reflecting on his time with big studio films, Pearce recalled, “The process of it felt way too big for me,” he told GQ Magazine, as quoted by Deadline.

He continued, “I can’t make this idea of studio films where you just get told what to do by people afraid to lose their jobs. I remember there were discussions at the beginning about how I was going to look. A couple of the executives say, ‘No, he’ll just cut his hair and he’ll just do this and he’ll do that.’ And I’m in the room going, ‘Hello?’ I’m immediately feeling like my intuition doesn’t mean anything here. That’s a killer for me.”

Pearce was also seen in Iron Man 3, which starred Robert Downey Jr. in the lead role.

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