Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

I finally sat down to watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for three reasons: I'd run out of "must-see" movies, I personally know people who love this movie, and it's landing at the top of many "Best of 2000-2009" lists. And after seeing the movie, I can't fathom why people are saying this is the best film of the last decade.

I'm not being sarcastic. I'm not being glib. I'm not deliberately trying to be antagonistic by penning a negative review of one of the most critically-acclaimed movies of my lifetime. I wanted to like Eternal Sunshine. I really did, and I tried my darndest to do so. But in the final analysis, I switched off my television, took the DVD out of the player, and shrugged, "Meh."

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind represents the latest in an unintentional series of "boy-meets-girl" movies here at The Cinema King. Here, the boy is Joel (Jim Carrey), and the girl is Clementine (Kate Winslet with a "you won't believe she's British" voice). Following a nasty break-up, the two separately elect to undergo a memory erasure procedure pioneered by Dr. Howard Mierzwiak (an underused Tom Wilkinson). Though Clementine accepts the ignorance-is-bliss philosophy offered by Mierzwiak and his team (which includes Mark Ruffalo, Kirsten Dunst, and Elijah Wood), Joel begins to regret his decision midway through the procedure as he struggles to remember his time, however bitter, with Clementine.

Aside from the imaginative premise of memory erasure and the inventive ways that director Michel Gondry devises to depict the practice, the film is disappointingly formulaic but without any effort put into making the formula believable. I didn't detect very much chemistry between Joel and Clementine; indeed, it seems as though all they do is goof around before making each other miserable. Consequently, the film's basic throughline - Joel's quest not to forget Clementine - is shallow and uninspiring. Simply put, the only reason to root for these characters is because we're told to. Clementine is mildly endearing - thank the always-divine Winslet for that - though she barely develops beyond the "manic pixie dream girl" trope. Carrey develops even less; he mopes lethargically through the movie without the convincing ennui that JGL employed in (500) Days of Summer. The supporting cast is decent, though they float through the movie with little to do beyond advance the plot; Wood's character shows creepy promise, but it's as though Kaufman & Co. didn't quite know what to do with him. Disappointment ensues.

The other major grievance I have against Eternal Sunshine is that it's brutally slow-paced, and when all your characters are extremely depressed without providing any reason for us to sympathize with them this can be a painful experience. Combine this with the predictability quotient exhibited by this movie, and the only reason I finished the movie was because I'm just that kind of a guy.

But I guess I can see why so many people love this movie. It's innocuous, and it's uncomplicated; it's got neat visual effects, a narrative spine (albeit a misued one), and a hopeful ending that affirms an optimism in the human condition. But for a #1 movie of the last ten years, I need a little more than marshmallow fluff. I need something incisive and at least slightly subversive, a movie that either tells me something I didn't know or tells me something that feels like the truth - not a Hollywood version of the truth. (An uncompromised ending apparently suggested that patients of the memory-loss program were bound to repeat their mistakes and need the procedure several times; this might have been more intriguing and would have at least made the film feel inventive and not just lethargically and slavishly optimistic.) So for some this may be a divine movie, but for me it's just plain disappointing. But that's the point of reviews; I'm leaning toward The Departed being the best movie of the last ten years, but maybe Eternal Sunshine fans find it deplorable. Fine.

Let me conclude by clarifying that I don't think that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a terrible movie. It's not; it's certainly no Next. It may not be great, but moreover it's just not "to my liking," nor can I explain why so many people are saying it was the best film of the last ten years. Now I almost have to write my own list.
The MPAA rated Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind R "for language, some drug and sexual content." F-bombs get dropped, there's some mild nuzzling/cuddling, all the girls end up in their underwear at some point in the movie, and a few characters smoke mariijuana. Language aside, this probably could have been a hard PG-13 if the filmmakers had aimed for it.

How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008)

I'd hate to think that Simon Pegg is a one-hit (with a few near-hits) wonder, but How to Lose Friends & Alienate People just didn't score a home run for me.

Based on Toby Young's memoir about his time on staff at Vanity Fair, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People is a cynical look at "making it" with Pegg starring as Sidney Young, an up-and-coming journalist climbing the periodical ladder after being hired by top editor Clayton Harding (Jeff Bridges). Coarse and unrefined, Sidney meets the ire of his immediate editors Alison Olsen (Kirsten Dunst) and Lawrence Maddox (Danny Huston) while trying to court the gorgeous but empty-headed starlet Sophie Maes (Megan Fox).

I haven't yet seen a Simon Pegg vehicle as laugh-out-loud funny as Shaun of the Dead (though Hot Fuzz came close), and after this one I'm still looking. How to Lose Friends & Alienate People is funny, but not consistently so and not usually for more than a snicker every five minutes. (Only one scene, in which Sidney's left leg suffers pretty serious injury repeatedly, elicited three consecutive gut-busters.) The script, consequently, is a little weak - especially for a comedy. It's formulaic in its worst places and only mildly charming in its best. Comedic shortcomings aside, the film suffers from what I call "Observe and Report syndrome" - that is, none of its characters are truly compelling, nor do we have good reason to root for any of them. Sidney's lovable, true, but it's a thin sheen covering a crass and predominantly unappealing core. Alison and Clayton are drawn in very broad strokes, with little characterization beyond "girl" and "boss," respectively; only Maddox has any real personality to him, thanks to a solid performance by the always reliable Huston.

Then there's Megan Fox, to whom I devote an entire paragraph because I've seen pretty much every one of her major features. Yet I don't seem to have learned my lesson with it all - Transformers, Jennifer's Body (that's about it, folks) - because she's as talented here as she has been in the other films in her canon. Translation: she looks pretty, but her acting ability is as glassy-eyed as her own striking face. She floats through the movie (well, except for that gratuitous scene where she walks through a swimming pool) without committing to an emotion, an inflection, or a facial expression beyond "vapid." Her delivery is unenthusiastic, her body language is entirely silent, and her emotional range goes from zero to one over the duration of the movie. She's gorgeous, but she's got about as much substance as that transparent dress she wears in her early scenes.

What's disappointing is that all of those involved (Fox excluded) can and have done much better work. Pegg was priceless in his collaborations with Edgar Wright, and I liked Dunst in the Spider-Man franchise. While Huston's good here, he's much better elsewhere (like in 30 Days of Night), and Bridges is criminally underused here; despite numerous allusions to The Big Lebowski (including White Russians, Port Huron, and a reference to Clayton being "the dude"), the film employs none of Bridges's trademark talewnt, though he manages to pull off a good deal of deadpan humor. Even director Robert B. Weide isn't doing his best, having cut his teeth on the uber-funny Curb Your Enthusiasm series.

Despite being mildly fun at moments, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People does not represent the best work of anyone here. Even Megan Fox has looked better.

How to Lose Friends & Alienate People carries an R rating "for language, some graphic nudity and brief drug material." Translation: F-bombs galore, a transsexual fully naked from the front (prosthetics doubtless involved), and cocaine presented twice.