I gave up

Rating: 2/10 (28 December 2005)

I normally watch films to the end, even if I don't like them, but sadly I couldn't go all the way with Eternal Sunhine. Anything seemed more interesting than this boring twaddle.
As such, having not seen it all, I don't feel that I can write a proper review. But really, nothing there was to latch on to, nothing of interest. This is one of those films where I think people rate it highly just because it blatantly tries so hard and is odd because it can be.
First of all there was some obvious jumping around going on, time wise, because events were out of order. It's really becoming a tired cliché of cinema. And while it works wonderfully in some films (Closer, Mulholland Drive et al) I just felt it was complication for complication's sake in this film.
But then what happens in this story? We have some teenagers wiping the lead character's memory while drinking his alcohol, smoking pot (ooh, how edgy) and larking about.
I'm sorry. We're meant to believe in this story where people have their MEMORIES WIPED (i.e. messing around with their brains) and they let stoned kids do it? Yeah right, that's realistic. Ridiculous.
Otherwise all that was happening was just flashes of the lead character's memories, which came across as one of those Star Trek episodes where one of the crew is being mentally invaded by some parasite or something, and the crew saves the crewmember in the end.
In short pointless, nothing to draw me in and this DVD is going on eBay. Maybe I'm missing something, after all this is high in the top 250. But whereas many films deserve it, I can't see what people see in this film.