Down by Eternal Sunshine

[trochee]

This week I saw two great movies courtesy of imtboo (have I mentioned I like her rather a lot?).

Last night we saw the second of them: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; last week we saw the first: Down By Law.

Sunshine was everything that Groundhog Day should have been (and I might add that Kate Winslet and Kirsten Dunst are both better actors than Andie MacDowell), along with a twist of Memento and maybe a little tiny bit of Existenz (for the Dick-ian questions of memory and reality) or Brazil, for the stalkerish brain-plumber/technicians played by Mark Ruffalo and Elijah Wood.

Down by Law, on the other hand, was essentially a Marx Brothers' jailbreak flick as assembled by Jim Jarmusch, only set in gritty New Orleans underworld. Tom Waits plays Groucho [mustachioed hyperverbal smartass]; Roberto Benigni is Chico [Italian malaprop-spouting physical goof], which leaves John Lurie to play a modified combo of the silent naive child that is Harpo and the overshadowed romantic "lead" that is Zeppo.

Okay, it's not really a Marx Brothers movie. But it's not a crazy way to look at it: Jarmusch says he filmed in black and white -- and allowed open shooting, with the camera quite still -- as a reference to Buster Keaton, and yet it has a film noir feel through the whole movie. The "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream" scene alone has yet to be topped in prison movies. Hilarious and terrifying at the same time.

Comments

[isolt.livejournal.com]

Really? I didn't find Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind depressing at all.

Requiem for a Dream, however, has given me a permanent wariness of arty movies that, however artistically good they may be, are completely punishing and awful for the audience. I don't demand happy endings or anything, but that movie was just torture.

[xaosenkosmos.livejournal.com]

(Don't take this the wrong way, i'm not making a value judgement, i'm just sayin')

You'd probably agree with me more if you or your close friends lived bits and pieces of them. Sunshine, especially, hit close to home. Requiem is the far end of a slide i've seen a few friends start down, and heard of friends-of-friends living through. While there's a lot of good money to be made by smart people with hustle, it's something i have (thus far) made a concious effort to avoid.

[boobirdsfly.livejournal.com]

I would say that Requiem is the only movie i will never see again. It is so utterly terrifying. The old lady esp. And i will also say that it's funny.. because the first time i saw Sunshine I went to the theatre by myself and i left in tears. Just devastated. I went back a few days later and saw all the hope in it. And this time, I felt both the devastation and the joy. It is such a multifacetted piece of Art. It truly is a piece of Art. In every way. And yes, Sunshine was close to home for me too ( or at least close to an older home ...)