In 2008, Will Fetters’ script “Memoirs” (now titled Remember Me) gained recognition from Hollywood types, landed on the Black List with six votes, prompted a sale, and will (on March 12) become his first feature credit.Twilight: Eclipse’s Robert Pattinson is starring in yet another Summit Entertainment release and surrounded with the capable cast of Oscar-winner Chris Cooper, Academy Award nominee Lena Olin, beautiful “Lost” actress Emilie de Ravin, and the always slick Pierce Brosnan. It’s not a flawless script, but it’s easy to see why they’re involved and how much promise Fetters shows as a writer.
Spoiler warning: The premise is deceptively simple. Two college students, Tyler (Pattinson) and Ally (Ravin), fall in love while each coping with the loss of a family member. Ally turns grief over her mother’s death inward, while Tyler wears a tattoo of “Michael” in bold lettering over his heart, a reminder that he lost his older brother at the World Trade Center.
At first I thought using the World Trade Center tragedy was a cheap tactic and a means to provide instant dramatic context. It’s usage immediately evokes a relatable reaction that has been mined — some might say exploited — for easy interaction and pre-packaged narrative conflict in the past. In 2002’s 25th Hour, an otherwise unrelated Ground Zero setting allowed Spike Lee to vent his frustration about the attack through the mouthpiece of his protagonist. 2007’s Reign Over Me depicted a disheveled Adam Sandler wallowing in self-pity, establishing a one-sided grief session with its audience in the process.
However, the script introduces the World Trade Center events subtly at first, lingering on the two towers in an opening description before using them as a backdrop for a drama about the victimization of innocents. Michael, a 20-something intern at the WTC loses his life to terrorists. Ally’s mother is gunned down by teenage thugs in a train platform robbery. Tyler’s gifted younger sister Caroline (Ruby Jerins) is bullied by her classmates. Tyler himself is brutalized by police after breaking up a street fight and mistaken as the instigator.
Tyler’s incident starts a chain of events where, under pressure from his best friend Aiden (Tate Ellington), he seeks revenge on the policeman (Cooper) who mistreated him. He begins dating the cop’s daughter, Ally, and what starts as a way to settle the score becomes a more meaningful relationship bonded by a mutual empathy for suffering and a disconnection from their respective fathers.
The characters in general are depressed. Tyler’s outings with his family are filled with awkward, pregnant pauses and passionate shouting matches with his business-burdened father (Brosnan). The remainder of the script’s early pages are about Tyler moping around with a chip on his shoulder, chain smoking, and scribbling journal entries. Aiden even describes Tyler as “brooding,” which sounds familiar for anyone who has seen Pattinson’s pained Edward expressions as a teen vampire.
Luckily, Tyler’s given a few directions to smile once in a while after he meets Ally, a cute classmate who eats her dessert first in a sort of personalized “carpe diem.” Aiden provides enough comic relief to keep the sagging middle from dipping into all out family melodrama; though he regularly serves as a crutch for Tyler to vocalize his intentions or to make suggestions that move the story forward.
The twist ending is what makes this script special, though. Without giving anything away, Fetters wrote a stunning conclusion that reflects not only on the plot already unfolded, but on our own recollections of the World Trade Center and its aftermath. He incorporates feelings of anger, resentment, regret, and sorrow from the story that are still present in society, bringing the focus full circle to themes of senseless violence and seizing your remaining days. You won’t see this finish coming.
Overall, the script takes a few predictable turns through family drama and its supporting characters could use more development, but the climax is what will have audiences thinking, discussing, and remembering this movie in March. Looking forward to it.
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