It's very difficult to keep the line between the past and the present.

You believe that someone out of the past can enter and take possession of a living being?

We may be true with the past, but the past is not through with us.

Welcome to the next picture show, a movie of the week podcast devoted to a classic film and how it shaped our thoughts on a recent release.

I'm Tasha Robinson here with...

Genevieve Kovsky.

Scott Tobias.

Keith Phipps.

Here on The Next Picture Show, we believe that no film exists in a vacuum and that all culture is more interesting in context.

So every other week, we get together to talk over a classic film and consider how it relates to a current movie. This week, we're looking at two very different movies about protagonists with the interior grade amnesia. One's a cartoon fish and one's a tattooed man, but both of them have learned to live with memory loss. Keith, I have a Polaroid of you here that says I should not believe your lies, but it also says I should ask you to tell us what we're up to this week.

Yeah, I'm going to burn that as soon as you aren't looking, Tasha. This week, we were inspired by the new animated Pixar movie, Finding Dory, a sequel to one of the studio's all-time biggest hits. And like 2003 is finding Nemo, it's a story of a fish crossing the ocean, looking for a missing family.

But this time around, the protagonist is Ellen DeGeneres' fish character, Dory, who's incapable of making new memories and keeps losing track of what she's doing. The conceit of the film is inescapably similar to Christopher Nolan's breakthrough feature, Memento, about a man who also can't make new memories, which doesn't stop him from trying to hunt down his wife's murderer.

Nolan's innovative script tells the story backward, so we know how it ends long before we find out how to interpret that ending.

It's more formally complicated and challenging than finding Dory, which is more directly aimed at kids, even than most Pixar films.

But both movies use the memory conceit to hide information from the audience until the story needs it, and both use it as a theme that lets the filmmakers think about identity and the stories we tell ourselves to survive. Right, Tasha? Tasha? Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot what we were talking about. I just need to look at my tattoos for a sec. Okay, this one says host two-part podcast. Oh, crap. This one says be less flippant about beloved movies. It's hard not to make the occasional memory joke when dealing with two films that are sometimes very rye and very funny about what their main characters can and can't remember. But rest assured, we're also going to look at the dramatic side of these stories and how they move our emotions while they're engaging our intellects. We all need mirrors to remind ourselves who we are, and sometimes films serve as that mirror. Natalie. You don't remember me. I'm sorry, I should have explained. I have this. You did explain Lenny. Please call me Leonard. My wife called me Lenny. Yeah, I know. You told me. Well, then I probably told you how much I hated it. Yeah. Do you mind taking me glasses off? It's hard for me to... Thanks. So you have information for me.

Is that what your little note says? Yeah. Must be tough living your life according to a couple of scraps of paper. You mix your laundry list with your grocery list and you'll end up eating your underwear for breakfast. I guess that's why you have those freaky tattoos. Yeah, it's tough. It's almost impossible. Look, I'm sorry I don't remember you. It's nothing personal.

I do have information for you.

You gave me a license plate number.

Had my friend at DMV trace it.

Guess what name came up?

John Edward Gamal, John G.

Do you know him?

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