December 31, 2009: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) is another in the line of films that make fans of screenwriter (and now director) Charlie Kaufman ecstatic about his genius, and non-fans adamant about his incomprehensibility. The twisted mind which brought us Being John Malkovich (1999) and Adaptation (2002), as well as the very dense experience that was Synecdoche, New York (2008), was working at full force here.
This is the story of a man and a woman who fall for each other and eventually break up, and then do it again, and again. I think. I can’t quite tell. Mind-erasing technology is being used, and it’s never entirely clear who has the upper hand or who is the puppet master. Mind you, my present viewing of this film was more in the background than the foreground and I knew perfectly well that I wasn’t going to figure it out this time, but that was fine with me since I’m not sure I’ll ever figure it out anyway.
Thus I won’t go into a whole lot of plot detail, but a brilliant cast including Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood, David Cross and Tom Wilkinson makes this a joy to watch. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a real treat, even though I’ve never understood it, and a well-deserved Oscar for its original screenplay shows that I’m not the only one who feels that way (about the understanding as well as the treat!). See it – you won’t be disappointed. I’d even recommend giving it your full attention.
Kaufman triumphs with another layered story.
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