Oblivion — Peter Abrahams
William Morrow
2005
Rating:


Twelve years ago, Nick Petrov and his partner Elaine Kostelnik garnered acclaim for solving the seven murders committed by serial killer Gerald Reasoner. The ghosts of that case return to haunt Petrov when he agrees to find Liza Rummel's daughter Amanda who, Petrov soon discovers, is really the daughter of Reasoner's final victim, Lara Deems. Collecting clues along the way, Petrov finds an overdosed Amanda and takes her to the hospital.

For most detective stories, this would be the end. But in Peter Abrahams' thrilling "Oblivion," this is only the beginning. On the way to the hospital, Amanda insists to Petrov that her mother's murder remains unsolved. Once they reach the emergency room, Petrov suffers a stroke and forgets everything about his investigation, even his last name. Given just 17 weeks to live, Nick struggles to reassemble the clues he has collected. It's a gimmick that shamelessly imitates "Memento," but it's one that comes with profound philosophical implications.

Taut, suspenseful, and surprisingly poignant, this suspense thriller is as much a mystery as it is a sensitive character study of a once brilliant detective coming to terms with his fading mental faculties. There's a deep sadness to Nick's tenacious, but slow, investigation that comes close to matching the post-stroke Frank Pembleton on "Homicide: Life on the Streets." Navigating near blind through time and space, Nick picks up the clues he collected and tries to make sense of them. It would be difficult to tolerate the plot once it laps itself if Nick were simply an inept detective. But Nick is so heartbreaking in his veracious investigation, holding firm to his somewhat crazy belief that Amanda's rescue could save his life (which it does, in a way), we desperately want Nick to succeed.

With Petrov's stroke, "Oblivion" starts to veer toward existentialism and calls attention to the duplicitous nature of memory, an epistemological thriller that dares to question how well we know ourselves. At one point, Nick is shown a videotape of his testimony at a trial. Nick doesn't remember the testimony, but he remembers the events that he relates, except for a declaration the defendant supposedly made. The reason he can't remember it is that Nick perjured himself while on the witness stand. Later, Nick is presented with the possibility that he killed Lara Deems. Nick is so wracked with guilt at this that he creates a memory of having an affair with Lara, leading to her murder. Adding to the meta madness is a made-for-TV movie about the Reasoner case, which serves as a humorous look at what Hollywood calls "truth."

While the idea of an amnesiac solving a crime is certainly akin to "Memento," it also recalls "The Conversation" and "Blow-Up." Just as Gene Hackman's Harry Caul has several pieces of audio recordings that he puts together without ever truly grasping their significance until it's too late, and David Hemmings' photographer Thomas tries to coax the truth out of his prints, Nick has all of the pieces of the puzzle, but he can't see the big picture. And like Jack Nicholson's Jake Gittes in "Chinatown," Nick has all of the right witnesses, but he keeps asking the wrong questions. It all adds up to be the stuff of great film noir, including a femme fatale and plenty of action sequences to keep things exciting. These action scenes have an added dimension of danger because of Nick's vulnerable state.

An obsessive and hypnotic novel, this tour de force of structural ingenuity and character development, "Oblivion" ranks as one of the best thrillers in years.

Posted Monday, May 30, 2005

Link to this review:
http://filmzeus.pressbin.com/book/peter.abrahams/oblivion