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Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2003)
 In the spirit of Eternal Sunshine let us forget that there was a Romantic Period (1785-1830) where poets Keats and Byron expounded upon the virtues of love, and presume that the era began in 1984 with Huey Lewis.
Don’t need money, don’t take fame
Don’t need no credit card to ride this train
It’s strong and it’s sudden and it’s cruel sometimes
But it might just save your life
That’s the power of love
A crude beginning to the era - kind of wordy - but it was a start.
Paul Thomas Anderson got a bit closer in 2002’s Punch Drunk Love culminating with this condensed gem: “I have a love in my life and it makes me stronger than you can possibly imagine.”
Today, the hailigah scribe Charlie Kaufman (with Michael Gondry) finds the essence of love with a single word in his magnificent script for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The word – “okay.”
We have been ushered into the renaissance by Kaufman, the wizard behind this splendid, provocative motion picture directed expertly by Gondry. Simply put, he is a brilliant human being making one mind-bending film after another (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) wherein he has formerly, with a sour comedic edge, skewered the fragility of our egos and championed the creative nature roiling inside. But, to our great benefit, he has chosen this time to turn his perversely thoughtful gaze to what we hope to consider the supreme emotion, the holy of holies – LOVE.
Sure, love has been played out and objectified until it is no longer a reality but an unreachable myth concocted by Hollywood and starring Julia Roberts – but wait – give Kaufman a chance to get to his “okay” and you may change your mind.
Let’s speak briefly of love just to gain some context. Love is not what you feel for your mom or your baby or your pet. You may love your spouse. You may be married but only love a high school girlfriend. You may have lived a hundred years and begot twenty grandchildren but only loved a stranger you encountered briefly on the bus sixty years earlier. The details of that bus ride – shimmering raindrops trickling down the dark windows – her half smile – that she was reading Willa Cather – a memory that lives in an impenetrable castle in your mind. We are talking about lightning powerful, all consuming, I would do anything love. I regret to say we are not all privileged to encounter such a thing – this movie and its impeccable nuances are essentially for the privileged class with a true knowledge of love. Otherwise…it’ll be kind of depressing.
In this breathtakingly romantic because it is at times so brutally unromantic (just like love of course) expose into matters of the heart and mind, we are challenged with a most diabolical question and moreover a courageous answer that purposely avoids betraying our insecurities. Whether the answer the film provides is honest is another story, but the audience will root for it to be true with a deeply felt passion.
To the diabolical question: Would we be happier if there was technology to completely erase a love from our mind – obviously a love that has caused staggering pain?
Not to push the sensitive issue with those of you who are in love, but I think we need to appreciate the validity of this query. Come on…think back to that day on the train after the cripplingly devastating fight with that significant other. Did you not in all honesty say to yourself, “I wish I had never gotten in to this. I wish I had never been involved with this person.” Now imagine, in your haste, you followed up on these thoughts by laying down a few bucks and surgically removed that devastation by erasing its source, your love. What would be the ramifications? Not only upon the baffled other waiting for your return home, but more cosmically, on destiny itself. Yes, Kaufman, like any serious romantic, is a believer in the bashert.
Please do not be put off by the idea that this is a “Jim Carrey” movie. This is the other Jim Carrey. The one that may win an Oscar one day if the field is weak enough. He does noble (and at times humorous) work as an introvert defying the system that (metaphorically) demands one give up on love at the first sign of tedium. Kate Winslet is the quirky beneficiary of his love, and she is a marvel, both in beauty and talent. The A list supporting cast is rounded out, mainly for laughs, occasionally for pathological insight, by Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood, and Tom Wilkinson as the staff of the clinic that can wipe clean your cortex. Of course the cast matters and these actors, particularly the leads, convey a wonderful sense of a lost and found (or is it found and lost?) relationship by reenacting segments from their vanishing memories, but the significance of the film is in both the writing and the chilling, sensual direction. There is a twist to this tale but elaborating upon it would be doing you a disservice. Needless to say, Kaufman is not one to go easy on your cognitive faculties.
Deep down (some deeper than others) we are all romantic. We cannot resist the allure, the awe inspired by two lonely human beings binding themselves in this cold chaos we call life and standing united till death do them part. Nor, for some reason, can we resist hurting the ones we love, despite every rational thought in our pitiful heads saying, “hold on to this person so tightly – they are your savior”! Eternal Sunshine provides a fascinating, utterly captivating education in this curious thing called the power of love.
SPENCER AWARD – LIRR Represent! Finally the train I take every day gets the spotlight as both main characters in this film inhabit and frequent both Rockville Center and Montauk. Watch the Gap and Change at Jamaica Forever!!!
Bangitout.com looks forward
to hearing from any readers who saw the movie and choose to contribute relevant
comments.
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Send your comments to bangitout Film Editor, Jordan Hiller at jtrick1@aol.com
READER COMMENTS
From Mark M.
Hello Mr. Jordan Hiller, your review for the movie was interesting and I also enjoyed the movie immensely but I sort of disagree with you regarding what you think love is based on the movie. In describing what love is you write "You may have lived a hundred years and begot twenty grandchildren but only loved a stranger you encountered briefly on the bus sixty years earlier." In the movie Jim Carrey's character asks why he falls in love with every girl who shows him the slightest bit of attention. That love is of the moment. That love is of the person at the moment that you fall in love with them and not of the person themselves. Can you say that there was still love between Joel and Clementine by the end of their relationship? Their relationship was built on that initial love and trying to retain it. That is acknowledged at the end of the movie when they feel that initial love once more and even though they know they will eventually come to hate each other they decide to run with it since it feels so good.
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