loved it

Rating: Null/10 (27 March 2004)

Charlie Kaufman has changed the way I think about movies and after seeing Adaptation, I knew I had to see Eternal Sunshine. I feel compelled to talk about my personal experience watching the movie so this won't be about technical stuff or character review. I immediately engaged with the story, and found myself at first struggling to understand what was going on...caught myself shifting into the paralysis of analysis. Thinking things like wait...that didn't make sense...why did he say that? So I made a conscious decision to drop that approach and found myself having a kind of out of body experience watching myself watching the movie and feeling a warm glow. Hmmm... this is me loving this movie. Not having to analyze every scene not having to contemplate what might happen next. My own viewing experience became dreamlike in the sense of appreciating the complexity without having to know all the answers. There was a moment somewhere in the film when I realized the significance of the opening scenes (hair color! hair color!) and then I relaxed into the memory/dream sequences with a kind of clarity about the cycle of the story. In the end, it all came together beautifully for me and I realized that I had participated in one of the most moving movie experiences of my life. I walked out wanting to talk to someone about what I had just seen...wanting to hear someone else's perspective. I'm meeting my husband in Las Vegas later today so am hoping it's playing there so we can see it together. In the meantime, I'm happy to have found this board and want to thank all of you for sharing your thoughts which have enriched my experience of the film.