Review of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) by Shane Z — 28 Feb 2014

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 "Elosia to Abelard".

Michel Gondry re-teams with screenwriter Charlie Kaufman for this off - the - wall romantic comedy.

The story is about a shy man Joel (Jim Carrey) who finds out his ex-girlfriend Clementine (Kate Winslet) has had all of her memories of him and their relationship erased from her mind and he decides to do the same. During the process that he's getting from Dr. Howard (Tom Wilkinson), Stan (Mark Ruffalo), and Mary (Kirsten Dunst), Joel sees he still loves Clementine, and doesn't want to let her go.

Charlie Kaufman is a genius, structuring a wonderful poem into a masterpiece that is touching, deep, and beautiful. It's the kind of film that means or is more than just people, it means heart, it means relation, and means charm. Full of a lot of happiness that utilizes the film with love and beauty for a story that comes to life. Carrey and Winslet both bring one of their greatest performances together. For Carrey, I loved his performance here and in The Truman Show, but I would like this over Truman because the first time I seen that at first I didn't care til I watched it again, while Eternal Sunshine I loved it.

Michel Gondry has the film be a hoop jumper to weird scenes to another which is twisty but all of Gondry's direction and Kaufman's Imaginative script all works well in this masterpiece.