Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2-Disc Collector's Edition)
by Michel Gondry
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Actor: Elijah Wood, Gerry Robert Byrne, Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Tom WilkinsonDirector: Michel Gondry
Brand: UNI DIST CORP. (MCA)
Writer: Michel Gondry
Producer: Anthony Bregman
Producer: Charlie Kaufman
Writer: Charlie Kaufman
Producer: David L. Bushell
Producer: Georges Bermann
Writer: Pierre Bismuth
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1; French (Dubbed), Dolby Digital 5.1
Format: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Collector's Edition, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, Dubbed, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 108 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2005-01-04
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Universal Studios
Product features:
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- AC-3; Closed-captioned; Collector's Edition; Color; Dolby; DTS Surround Sound; Dubbed; DVD; Subtitle
DVD Reviews of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2-Disc Collector's Edition)
DVD Review: I KNOW These People
Summary: 5 Stars
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is another Jim Carey movie I wasn't too sure about. He's had a better track record lately with his more serious films, so I was willing to give it a shot. And I'm glad I did.
Combining all the mental hijinks of Memento and the mind-bending, "is this reality?" confusion of movies like Strange Days and eXistenz, the movie essentially posits one question: if you could erase any one experience from your mind, would you?
But before we get to that question, we see Joel Barish (Jim Carey) meet Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet) on a train. It's supposedly happenstance, and the two hit it off immediately. These first five minutes carry the whole movie. The two actors exhibit just enough nuanced familiarity that it's alternately exhilarating and creepy-they FEEL like they've known each other their entire lives. The rest of the movie then swings back to the circumstances leading up to their meeting.
Joel has, in fact, met Clementine before and had a whirlwind romance that somewhere along the lines lost its whirl. They are strikingly different personalities who find attraction in their opposite: Joel is cautious, Clementine's a maniac. Joel is quiet (hard to believe Carey playing quiet, I know), Clementine is a bundle of energy. They alternately drive each other crazy and are crazy about each other. But unfortunately, the nature of the relationship is so tempestuous that the possibility of erasing one's memory is simply too tempting. Like a madman with a pocket nuke, it's inevitable that Clementine's personality will succumb to the lure of memory erasing...but the consequences have grave repercussions.
Hurt and desperate, Clementine's brash decision pushes Joel to do the same thing. If she's going to erase him, well he's going to do the same thing right back at her! It's a procedure that takes an entire night and it's only a few days into the erasing of her memories that Joel realizes he LIKES his pain, his angst, his embarrassment, and even his hatred of her. The ups and downs, the good and bad parts of their relationship, are ultimately inseparable, and Joel realizes he will lose a part of his soul along with Clementine should his memory of her be erased.
So he fights it. Thus have another plot thread, as Joel drags his memory of Clementine with him through the dark hallways of his mind. All the while, Joel is pursued in the real world by the Lacuna Memory Erasure team. Dr. Howard Mierzwiak (Tom Wilkinson) leads the team, a kindly father figure who is not nearly as nice as he seems. Stan (Mark Ruffalo) and Patrick (Elijah Wood) assist the good doctor, making an on-site visit to Joel's house. Which is at least as horrifying as it is comedic, because while Joel is in a drugged coma on his bed, Stan and Patrick eat his food, drink his beer, get high, and practically have an orgy in his apartment.
Like Memento, Spotless Mind posits that when people aren't looking, the ethics of society don't just fall apart, they explode...whatever you imagine people might do to you while you're helpless is just the tip of the iceberg. Patrick proves just who unethical he is when we discover he has decided to take advantage of Clementine by recycling all of Joel's memories-memories that were supposedly destroyed to complete the erasure process.
As if that weren't enough, Dr. Mierzwiak's assistant Mary (Kirsten Dunst), is dating Stan. The secret she uncovers about herself and her work will shatter the Lacuna program and the lives of all those who it touched.
The director takes an innovative twist on how he conveys the dream world. Images become faded and indistinct. Sound crackles in and then whispers away. Some scenes appear to be lit exclusively by a flashlight, perfectly representing the selective memory of Joel's mind. Other scenes are lensed in distinct colors of yellow and blue. Still other scenes are nightmarish-people are faceless, bodies slide off into darkness, and as Joel's mind stumbles under the technological assault, structures and people literally collapse in front of him.
Ultimately, it's Charlie Kaufman's writing that perfectly blends what could be a horrible mess. Just when you think all the various plotline could not possibly be resolved...we're back at that train, and the thrill and awkwardness of that first attraction.
Spotless Mind is about the maturation of a romance and the decision every couple must go through when they realize that the "honeymoon is over." Joel and Clementine come to a crossroads and stumble horribly astray, just as so many couples fall apart every day without the benefit of erasing the memories of their exes. Love, Kaufman seems to say, is about the person you are after the honeymoon is over.
Carey is suitably restrained, which makes him seem all the more pathetic when the movie focuses on the happier, more energetic times. His hair is a mop top, is sweaters always rumpled. In short, he's a sad sack that Carey captures perfectly...a funny man who has nothing to laugh about.
Dunst plays a perfectly awkward, clueless young girl dealing with a technology she does not understand. Her characters growth, destruction, and rebirth steals the show. The other characters are suitably dazed and confused, not the least of which is Wood's not-Frodo-anymore Patrick. He's so fresh-faced, it's hard to believe he's doing such disrespectful things to Clementine.
But by far, Winslet plays the most compelling character of her career. Winslet not only adopts an American accent, she plays Clementine as herself (a sometimes whiny, neurotic mess), as Joel remembers her (erotically playful, maddeningly confusing, and sometimes just a shrew), and as echoes of Joe's memories. This is a lot to pull off for anybody, but Winslet never missed a beat.
Perhaps the biggest compliment I can give this movie is that I KNOW these people. See it, and you will too.
Description of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2-Disc Collector's Edition)
Studio: Uni Dist Corp. (mca) Release Date: 01/04/2005 Starring: Jim Carrey Elijah Wood Run time: 108 minutes Rating: RScreenwriters rarely develop a distinctive voice that can be recognized from movie to movie, but the ornate imagination of Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) has made him a unique and much-needed cinematic presence. In Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, a guy decides to have the memories of his ex-girlfriend erased after she's had him erased from her own memory--but midway through the procedure, he changes his mind and struggles to hang on to their experiences together. In other hands, the premise of memory-erasing would become a trashy science-fiction thriller; Kaufman, along with director Michel Gondry, spins this idea into a funny, sad, structurally complex, and simply enthralling love story that juggles morality, identity, and heartbreak with confident skill. The entire cast--Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Kirsten Dunst, Elijah Wood, Mark Ruffalo, Tom Wilkinson, and more--give superb performances, carefully pitched so that cleverness never trumps feeling. A great movie. --Bret Fetzer
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