A young writer who follows strangers for material meets a thief who takes him under his wing.A young writer who follows strangers for material meets a thief who takes him under his wing.A young writer who follows strangers for material meets a thief who takes him under his wing.
- Awards
- 5 wins & 4 nominations
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaSir Christopher Nolan came up with the idea for the film because he had his home broken into and wondered what the people thought as they went around looking at his belongings.
- GoofsDuring the safe robbery, Bill is clearly shown wearing gloves, most noticeably when he pulls the paper with the combination from his pocket. However, as he starts to open the safe, the gloves are gone and they never reappear.
- Crazy creditsThe movie was filmed from 1996 to 1997 and first released in 1998. However, the copyright date in the credits is listed as being 1999.
- Alternate versionsThe Criterion Collection DVD features an additional "Chronological Edit" of the film, which places the scenes in linear order.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Smashing UK Top 10: Top 10 Film Directors (2013)
Featured review
Stalking as a hobby; burglary as a thrill
In this intriguing noir thriller (looking like the Forties, but with a psychology befitting the Nineties), Director Christopher Nolan employs a number of techniques he would perfect in his internationally acclaimed Memento (2000), most notably scenes presented out of time sequence for effect, and a naive protagonist taken advantage of by others. The film opens with "Bill, the Innocent" (as I might dub him), played by Jeremy Theobald, trying to explain to someone, perhaps a social worker, perhaps even a police inspector (John Nolan), why he took up following people just for the fun of it. He doesn't just follow women, he points out. He's not a stalker, as such. He's just curious. He's an intriguing and sympathetic character, a Brit writer with a lot of time on his hands who seems something of a throwback to an earlier age with his clanking manual typewriter and the photo of a pursed-lips Marilyn Monroe on the wall of his shabby apartment. Things began to go wrong for him, he further explains, when he broke some of his "following rules" and got too close to his prey. What he doesn't know and what we don't know yet, is that his clumsy following technique has allowed him to unwittingly become the followed himself. Enter a juicy blonde (Lucy Russell) walking down some steps from her apartment. (This scene is out of sequence as far as chronological time goes, but psychologically speaking, her appearance signals his entanglement). Enter now a scheming, sophisticated psychopathic thrill-seeker named Cobb (Alex Haw) who entices Bill with his (apparent) practice of burglary just for the powerful feeling one gets from invading the sanctity of another's life. Although justification for the temporal inversions here is not as clearly established as in Memento, nonetheless the technique works well, and Nolan provides us with a clever ending that sneaks up on us and makes in a few seconds all that went before clear. Or mostly clear. You might want to rewind and view the first few minutes of the film, and then everything should be clarity. This low-budget, black and white, deliciously ironic little film (71 minutes) marked the auspicious debut of a film maker who has already made quite a name for himself, not only with the aforementioned Memento, but with Insomnia (2002). It will be interesting to see what Nolan does next.
helpful•4210
- DennisLittrell
- Feb 14, 2003
Details
Box office
- Budget
- $6,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $48,482
- Gross worldwide
- $126,052
- Runtime1 hour 9 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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