Film Critique: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Who am I?

I ask myself this question whenever I am in a time of stress and or discomfort. My answers usually consists of I am a person who dreams of achieving incredible feats, with a family who is loving and supportive. I have friends who care for me as I care for them. I am health, and what ever stresses I have, can be summed up with the amount of school work the given week brings.

Is there a self that I can control?

The self that I can control is knowing how and when to put up personal filters. What I mean by personal filters is, knowing what to say in specific situations or knowing how to behave when I am in select company. Not acting on emotion is another way of using a personal filter. In the movie "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" Both Joel and Clementine reacted to an emotion and erased their memories of each other. In my opinion this was silly because even though the memories may be painful to think about after a break up, but those memories help build our personal filters and protect us from a similar situation.

What Forces Shape our sense of Self?

The forces of the past help shape who we are in the present.

The Self as I see it

A man walks down the street,
He says, Why am I soft in the middle now?
Why am I soft in the middle?
The rest of my life is so hard!
I need a photo-opportunity,
I want a shot at redemption!
Don't want to end up a cartoon,
In a cartoon graveyard .....

Bonedigger, Bonedigger,
Dogs in the moonlight.
Far away, my well-lit door.
Mr. Beerbelly, Beerbelly,
Get these mutts away from me!
You know, I don't find this stuff amusing anymore ....

If you'll be my bodyguard,
I can be your long lost pal!
I can call you Betty,
And Betty, when you call me,
You can call me Al!

A man walks down the street,
He says, Why am I short of attention?
Got a short little span of attention,
And whoa, my nights are so long!
Where's my wife and family?
What if I die here?
Who'll be my role-model?
Now that my role-model is ....
Gone ...... gone,
He ducked back down the alley,
With some roly-poly, little bat-faced girl.
All along .... along ....
There were incidents and accidents,
There were hints and allegations .....

If you'll be my bodyguard,
I can be your long lost pal!
I can call you Betty,
And Betty, when you call me,
You can call me Al!
Call me Al ......

A man walks down the street,
It's a street in a strange world.
Maybe it's the Third World.
Maybe it's his first time around.
He doesn't speak the language,
He holds no currency.
He is a foreign man,
He is surrounded by the sound, sound ....
Cattle in the marketplace.
Scatterlings and orphanages.
He looks around, around .....
He sees angels in the architecture,
Spinning in infinity,
He says, Amen! and Hallelujah!

If you'll be my bodyguard,
I can be your long lost pal!
I can call you Betty,
And Betty, when you call me,
You can call me Al!
You can call me Al ......

This is a song written by Paul Simon and the reason I chose this song is because it is about a very basic concept of the interest in some other persons self. The man in the story's name is Al and he is trying to connect with the girl that he loves. Everyday us as humans have interest in the opposite sex and that interest has a lot to do with who we are. People were designed to be attracted to one another and it only human nature to get excited when something we like is within our reach.

How One Speeks Defines Who They Are

Unfortunately for me I only speak one language, and I often find myself struggling with this one. The English language is the only language I speak and my dialect is Tri-State lingo. Now mind you I have no idea if this is a proper adjective for the dialect in which I speak, but I come for what is know as the Tri-State area of America.

The other day I herd my one friend talking to a girl and their conversation was more or less just back and forth flirting.By the end of the conversation, after enough courage was stirred up my friend ask if he could see the girl again.

Instrumentality's
The style of speech was nervous laughter in the beginning of the conversation but as it progressed it gradually moved towards laid back comfortable flirting.

Norms
The normality of the conversation was my friend was supposed to be nervous at first glance of their discussion.

Genre
And finally the style of the encounter would definitely fall under the genera hookups. I say hookups because the two were able to connect with some type of chemistry and eventually the two will hook up.