Cheap clone of Memento

Try watching Memento and this movie back to back and thinking this movie is unique.

Teddy? Leonard? Memory problems? Him fooling himself by 'creating a quest for himself'?

I mean, when you start listing the similarities, they keep coming and seemingly never end.

This is one of those movies you have to watch at least twice to understand what's going on and why, but the problem with this kind of 'twist' movies is that people love twisting around what's being shown and told, because these movies always leave TOO MUCH to the imagination, and present too much ambiguity, so in the end, it becomes another '2001 Space Odyssey', with Kubrick himself even pointing out that at least on some level, the movie is 'whatever the viewer wants it to be'.

This is lazy and bad writing. It's easier to create a mystery and put all kinds of 'unexplained weirdness' into a movie and never explain anything and be thought of as genius, than actually writing a good, coherent story (hopefully without a stupid, cliché twist) and knowing what happens and why, and explaining everything (or at least enough) to the viewer.

Seinfeld is so guilty of this; there are just 'mysteries' that you are supposed to laugh at and then forget, and never resolve, because the writers couldn't think of how to solve them. It's an easy way out, a cop-out, if you will (though this movie tries to do an 'anti-cop-out', as in the guy we think is a cop, really isn't).

Can anyone honestly watch Memento and this, and think this movie deserves to exist or is better than Memento? I mean, at least in Memento, MORE was explained, and even IF you want to hallucinate all kinds of theories about it, at least the movie _DOES_ give us a full explanation as to what happened and why, however 'unreliable' as the narrator may be.

In THIS movie, nothing is explained, things just 'happen' and then there's a 'twist' that you can twist around and explain to yourself ANY way you want. What were the migraines? Why does everyone act so weirdly? Was the cave woman a hallucination (if so, why is she so coherent - perhaps the only coherent and truthful part of this movie, going as far as actually exposing how it all works in real life, too)? Why would everyone go THAT far to let this crazy, violent lunatic 'roleplay' his fantasy, as to let him explode a CAR and stick a needle to their own neck? Who was the disfigured guy in the cell that's going to be lobotomized, and why is .. his story was never really explained much, why would the protagonist beat him up if he thinks he's a cop?

It's like.. there are just 'mysteries upon mysteries' and nothing makes sense. Why are there so many papers flying around, when the only way that could ever happen, is if people keep throwing them from above constantly? Why is there so much propaganda about 'concentration camps', as if we're never supposed to question or forget the official story (which, when researched, actually becomes very questionable, as in, it's full of holes and discrepancies that require answers that no one wants to give, except a few people labeled some kind of lunatics and criminals)...?

At its core, this movie is just a cheap clone of Memento, very disappointing, incoherent and messy, unlike Memento, that was well thought-out and cohesive, if simplistic and a bit stupid as a story (Leonard is vile, evil character, but also makes really stupid choices).

This movie is not worth the hype - no one needs this movie after watching Memento, as this movie doesn't really offer anything Memento doesn't do much better.