Eternal Sunshine

Today's Valentines day. Not that I care but I must take this opportunity to write about an unique movie that is set on Valentines day and makes decent fun of it.

A romantic comedy has three step formula, boy meets girl, girl breaks up with the guy, boy gets her in the end. There is even lesser you can put inside it. Therefore some of us disregard them as uninspired mushy stuff which most of the times they are. But there are times when a so-called romantic comedy get on your nerves. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind do exactly that. What do your memories mean to you, What if you like to forget the stuff you cannot get over, What about connection between Heart and Mind, what rules over what. Can bitterest of the memories have sweetest bit. Can we get over someone easily. Can love be erased altogether. Eternal sunshine don't answer any of these questions but raise all of them all the time.

Most of proceedings of the movie take place in minds of unassuming Joel and beautifully uninhibited Clementine. You get in and get out their heads and all those sequences are crafted with millimeter perfection. The inventive non-chronological way of storytelling looks made for the narrative. You go back and forth, in and out, from beach to frozen river.

Intentional loss of some specific memory forms the base of the movie. If you are not able to forget someone you loved, then Lacuna's services are just made for you. Clementine gets 'it' done and Joel goes for it just to realize that those bitter memories are too sweet to loose. And we see his tussle to cling to the faintest of the memories that are getting ripped off one by one. And here all the magic takes place.

I am always interested subplots given they are cleverly done, here also there is a brilliant subplot of Mary and Dr. Howard which give Eternal Sunshine a wider perspective.

What makes Eternal sunshine so rewarding is the fact that it is unlikely any movie I have seen, leave aside the romantic comedy genre. Eternal Sunshine do fit in the 3 step formula of a romantic comedy but rips everything inside it and we enjoy this mind-blowing carnage.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.
Alexander Pope, "Eloisa to Abelard"