RKillgore

The thread about best DVD blind buys reminded me that I bought Following based on the fact that it was directed by Christoper Nolan, who also directed Memento. Unfortunately, I've put off watching it; whenever I would start to watch, things would be too noisy around me. Well, I finally had a quiet morning and had the movie in mind.
Very impressive, especially considering that this is Nolan's first feature. A film noir, it is the story of a young writer wanna-be, Bill, who has a hobby of following people to get writing ideas. A harmless hobby, people are unaware that he does this, until he follows Cobb, who is onto his game. Cobb is a burglar, who also knows about intruding onto people's lives. Of course, Bill gets drawn into this much deeper than he ever intended.
Filmed in black and white, it also uses a non-linear time presentation, as Memento did. The elements of intrusion, burglary and possessions make you look around and think about your own home and feel a little bit uneasy about it.
So, I wanted to find out what others at DVDTalk thought about it. Did a search and found nothing. So, thought I'd get the ball rolling and recommend this.

Saxofonix

I too was very impressed with this movie, and enjoyed it more than Memento.

evenflow

I've seen it and I wasn't impressed by it. It was kind of boring.

fmian

The story sounds awfully similar to Richard Laymons book 'Night in the Lonesome October'

joltaddict

I didnt particularly like it. And I loved Momento.

fumanstan

Why does everyone misspell it 'momento' =\

joltaddict

I misspell everything, its not like Im singling out Memento.

audrey

Well, like Andrew Johnson said: "It's a damn poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word."

As to The Following, I'm on the fence--I found it interesting in that student-film way--it's an amazing achievement given the budget and weekend shooting constraints. But ultimately I find it lacks energy, almost like there is too much distance between the audience and the characters--I found myself watching the movie rather than experiencing it. I am glad I saw it and will no doubt revisit it again one day.

fnordboy

I actually liked it better than Memento. Don't know why, I probably enjoyed the characters more in this than in Memento.

Memento is technically the better movie probably, but after watching Following I felt I enjoyed it more. <shrug>

caiman

Put me down as one who absolutely loved this movie. Like most of you, I bought it blind based on my love of Memento, and I wasn't disapointed.

Tarantino

I thought it was 'okay'. Nothing spectacular.

DumDum

Caught it on satellite the other day. Definitely an interesting movie, but probably something I wouldn't watch again.

badger1997

I thought it was okay at best. Enjoyable, but when i saw it a couple years ago I leaned over to my friend and made a comment that it reminded me of Hitchcock for some reasons. Later on that week we caught "Dial M For Murder" at a local arthouse and I felt like Nolan had more or less ripped some stuff off directly from Hitchcock. That brought it down a few points for me at least.

davejt1

Just caught this the other day on IFC. I thought it was pretty interesting - I really liked it. Very good story - liked the bit of a twist at the end where many of the pieces fell into place. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Memento just to gain a better understanding of the film's style and visual imagery.

However, it was a little confusing at first with the non-linear style (IMHO it was easier to anticipate the time changes in Memento). FYI - It's only 70 minutes long.

Professor Frink

BTW - the movie is called Following, not The Following.


I also bought it blind and loved it! After his first three films, I have added Christopher Nolan to my short list of directors whose films I will see no matter what. (along with Quentin Tarantino, Kevin Smith, and a few others)

audrey

You are, of course, absolutely right.

RKillgore

I haven't watched the linear-chronological version yet(it's on the DVD BTW and much easier to access than the one on Memento SE). That must be maybe 55 minutes long? Since it starts out as Bill's deposition, it makes sense that it jumps around, as someone telling such a complicated chain of events would. I wonder if they were intent on telling the story and found it too short and used the non-linear style to stretch it out without going over budget?

And speaking of features on the DVD:
Commentary by Christopher Nolan
Second Angle Showing Director's Shooting Script
Linear-chronological restructuring
Fullscreen (but that seems to be OAR)
Audio: English 2.0 Dolby Stereo (again, no frills)
Subtitles: English, Spainish
Trailers for Following and Memento
Cast & Crew Biographies

Decently priced at DDD >$15