Narrative technique · used in 4 films
Telling the story through diaries or accounts that characters read or tell about each other, sometimes one inside another. Each writer has their own memory, bias and motives, so no version is fully reliable.
Examples
Christopher Nolan · 2006
Angier and Borden each read the other's diary, and both diaries are written to mislead. So your information comes through a chain of narrators you can't trust, each one reading the other's deliberate lies. That is, the film hides its twist inside the way it tells the story.
Where to see it: Angier reading Borden's diary. He doesn't realize Borden wrote it knowing an enemy would read it.
Wes Anderson · 2014
The film has 4 layers of storytelling. A girl reads the Author's book, the Author recalls his 1968 meeting with old Zero, old Zero tells the story and young Zero lives through the events with Gustave. Each layer puts more distance between you and what happened. It raises the question of how accurately Zero (and therefore anyone) can remember another person's life.
Where to see it: The film's nested frame introduction. The author, the book, the interview and the hotel are each set up as a layer before the story begins.
David Fincher · 2014
The film runs on 2 first-person accounts you can't trust. One is Nick's investigation in the present and the other is Amy's diary of the past. Each is shaped by what its author wants. The layered accounts make the film's point about marriage. It is 2 people living inside stories they have written about each other and mistaken for the truth.
Where to see it: The parallel cutting between Nick's investigation and Amy's diary. The film lays out both accounts side by side. Only later do you find out that neither can be trusted.
Park Chan-wook · 2016
The Uncle keeps a library of rare books, including sadistic erotic texts, and Hideko reads them aloud to audiences of men. He also sells forgeries. The texts form a system of control through words, set inside the film's own manipulation through storytelling. The library mirrors the structure of the film. Both are built from texts you can't trust, designed to control their audience.
Where to see it: Hideko's reading sessions in the library. She performs sadistic erotic texts for the Uncle's guests. It is one untrustworthy text placed inside the film's own untrustworthy narration.
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