“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” (Focus Films)
There are some movies whose very title makes them sound pretentious and fake. Such is “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” Add in the fact it was written by the always bizarre Charlie Kaufman (“Adaptation,” “Being John Malkovich”) and multiply its “art” quality by yet another serious performance by Jim Carrey, and you end up with a film that critics will love and audiences will basically ignore.
The movie opens in the middle of the story and jumps back and forth to tell it completely. Joel (Carrey) and Clementine (Kate Winslet) meet at a train station in Montauk, NY and are instantly drawn to each other. She thinks she might have met him before but he doesn’t remember ever meeting her. Soon you realize the reason they don’t know each other is because they have had the memories of each other erased from their minds.
A clinic run by Dr Howard Mierzwiak (Tom Wilkinson) can do this. He employs a receptionist, Mary (Kirsten Dunst), and two technicians, Stan and Patrick (Mark Ruffalo and Elijah Wood). In the out of sequence flow the audience gets to see Joel undergoing de-memorization by Stan, Mary and Patrick. Clementine has her “erasure” occur off camera.
The plot is inventive but tiring, plus the two lead characters don’t ever seem to learn anything from their mistakes. They are as wrong for each other at the end of the movie as they were at the start.
Winslet manages to give Clementine a little depth as she explores the insecurities of the character. Still even an actress as talented as she, can’t make the character anything less than annoying. As Joel, Carrey is still trying for that big dramatic moment, and it never arrives. He plays Joel as a one-note song full of teary-eyed mood swings and fumbling hesitations.
The supporting cast, which is led by Ruffalo, Dunst, Wood and Wilkinson, is instantly forgettable. Or maybe I just had them erased from my memory. ‘
The movie is rated R for profanity.
A movie such as this one screams art with a capital “A” while offering entertainment with a little “e.” It is a slow moving, confusing mishmash of events which never engages the audience. Joel and Clementine’s relationship is supposed to be a great love story which overcomes all odds to arrive at fruition. What you get is a repetitious look at two mismatched people who keep getting in each other’s way.
I scored “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” an eclipsed 4 out of 10.
