As I was perusing the aisles of Hollywood Video a few days ago, I was anxiously looking for my DVD fix that would help to get me through the cold, rainy weekend. Somehow I stumbled across a DVD titled, "Following" from the director of "Memento." Now if you have ever seen "Memento," you know this was an exciting discovery to stumble upon.

So I threw that puppy onto the rental counter and took it home with me for a walk.

I must say, I was rather pleased with the movie, from beginning to end. Director Christopher Nolan did an outstanding job with the direction and cinematography. Just like "Memento," it was all very offbeat and the timing of the movie was trivial. The plot would go back and forth in time to finally paint the entire picture. The English actors, Jeremy Theobald and Alex Haw, did very well convincing, and later on confusing, the viewer by playing their characters so well. The black-and-white look was a bit frightening in the beginning but it was easy to adjust to once the plot started to thicken.

The story is practically impossible to explain without giving away the awesome twist(s) that it entails. However, it is about a young man who is desperately seeking material to write about. He wanders the streets of London hoping for some sort of inspiration and finds that he can develop his characters within the people of the streets. So he follows them.

It continues to the point where one of the people he is watching knows that he's being followed. The man convinces him to follow him further and they get mixed up in a big mess of thievery, scams, and such. Later on, the follower totally screws up when a person he's following becomes a slight obsession and he eventually needs to take his head out of his rearend.

As confusing as I may have attempted to explain it all, the movie is very neat. Everything connects but you don't quite realize it until the very end. I recommend you go out and rent "Following." What surprised me most is that this was released in 1998, and it wasn't heard of by many. "Memento's" exposure encouraged its release overseas and if you already haven't, watch "Memento" too! Christopher Nolan is practically creating a whole new genre of flicks.