Mar. 28, 2004 - 1:35 pm
ever since i first saw the preview for this movie i had been wanting to see it. very very awesome looking and written by Charlie Kaufman no less. i've talked about him quite a bit on this diary before. he has an amazing gift. so i told keith that i might go and see it last night and he had to come with me.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is about a man named Joel (Jim Carrey) who one day goes to see his girlfriend at work and she doesn't even recognize him. he at first feels like a complete jerk and then gets a card in the mail that says that she has had a procedure done to erase their relationship from her memory. he was hopelessly in love with her and decides that he has to have the procedure done as well or else he won't know what to do. as Lacuna Inc. comes to his house and begins to erase his relationship with Clementine (Kate Winslet) from his memory, he subconsciously decides that he needs to hang on to her and begins to fight back by hiding her in different parts of his psyche.
Keith and i both really really loved this. it's an awesome film in basically every way possible for me. the editing is awesome. there are lots of great new digital effects used to show the destruction on Joel's memories, like people getting phased out of existence, books disappearing, and different realities being melded together visually. you really feel like you're inside someone's head even moreso than in Charlie Kaufman's previous work in Being John Malkovich (1999).
we also talked about how Kate Winslet gains a lot of respect from us for her performance here. we already knew Jim Carrey was capable of doing a great role like this one, but Kate Winslet definitely shines in this movie. she does a great job as the caring but exceedingly complex and somewhat venemous Clementine.
i've also hated having to see Kirsten Dunst onscreen over the last few years. there are very few parts that i like her in. basically i have the impression that she is a petty and bad person in general and that always comes across to me onscreen. luckily in this film she doesn't have a huge role. she's definitely a character that you see throughout, but she's mostly not the focal point of the film.
anyway, enough chatter. go see Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. you'll thank me.