(Continued from Page One)
In "Eternal Sunshine..." the small, seemingly insignificant details that form the skeletal structure of the couple's relationship are dismantled, examined, and reconfigured by the company's dysfunctional medical staff, as played by Tom Wilkinson, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood and Kirstin Dunst.
The removed memories are demonstrated in real time from within Joel's head, with whole characters, objects, and settings literally disappearing before the audience's eyes.
The film's narrative construction is perfectly suited for Gondry's frenetic visual
stylings and Kaufman's meta-textual canoodlings, with the result being a well-orchestrated
work of mad beauty.
"I listen to a lot of contemporary music and we talk about John Cage," says Gondry, who also once served as drummer for French punk band Oui Oui.
"He would create this frame that was very rigid and within that frame would be all of this chaos. I like the idea of mixing something very structured and something very chaotic – either a chaotic structure with precision in-between or a precise structure with chaos in-between."
For both men, chaos seems to be a reigning, almost necessary factor in their creative process.
"Disorganization is helpful for me," says Kaufman.
"If you know too much where you're going then you can do it too expediently. This happens a lot to me – I'm really stuck and I can't think of anything for a week and a half and then I'll think of something and I'll be like 'oh my god, I'm so glad I got stuck.'
What if I'd come up with another idea a week and a half earlier? This movie would have gone in a completely different direction and I'm really glad I got stuck. It happens again and again to me."
Kate Winslet, Michel Gondry, and Mr. Kaufman avec chapeau.
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Adding to the chaos of "Eternal Sunshine" is the presence of Jim Carrey.
In the liner notes on Gondry's Directors Series DVD, the director mentions how proud he was of preventing the actor from walking off the set in one particularly difficult bath scene.
Carrey's legendary off-kilter persona may have proved difficult at times, but seems oddly appropriate for this film, a drastic break from the high-priced mega-star's typical mainstream comedy fare.
"Jim was right for the part because he's both a child and an adult at the same time and he's not very reasonable. If he plays it very quiet then you can feel that. He doesn't have the macho syndrome that a lot of actors have. I could never identify with a guy with a lot of natural cruelty."
To offset Carrey's hyperkinetic energy, the director enlisted the help of Kate Winslet.
"Jim was first to be cast and we needed someone strong to balance him. Clementine is clearly the character with more life in Charlie's script and we needed someone with the strength to face Jim and beat Jim, so we met a lot of different actresses and it seemed like when we met Kate, she had this different kind of energy," says Gondry.
"She's a great actress and she doesn't really seem to be part of the whole movie star thing. She's really funny. I remember her from 'Holy Smoke' when she was really driving this guy (Harvey Keitel) nuts and she had to be Clementine."
The presence of Carrey and Winslet will likely bring a certain measure of commercial success to the film, but the fascinatingly complex storyline is bound to confuse the holy bejeezus out of the average film-goer out looking for the typical Hollywood star-driven Hollywood romantic comedy.
Luckily for all of us, America's most talented and innovative screenwriter isn't too concerned.
"I really don't think about other people when I'm writing. I think about what I'm interested in and how I can struggle to do something interesting and honest, no matter how that might turn out," says Kaufman.
"I'm perfectly happy to fail in my attempt. In fact I welcome it – I think that if you're going to do something original you'll have to embrace the idea of failure and I do."
Links:
Official website: www.eternalsunshine.com
For information on the revolutionary painless non-surgical memory erasing process,
visit www.lacunainc.com.
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Written by Richard Sharp
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004: Kaufman, Gondry
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