Azura's' Home Planet

Analysis of Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind

Mary Svevo, the office assistant at the memory wiping clinic, and Clementine are intricate displays of the ways in which memory informs identity. Using my personal experience as an example, my identity as a person is informed by my spiritual practice that includes ancestral veneration and looking to the past to inform my present and shape my future. My connection to my ancestors keeps grounded. It also ties my ethnic identity both to the United States and Africa; It is an anchor in a world that seeks to invalidate my existence as an African-descended queer woman. My identity not only comes from my interactions from my ancestors, they come from my interaction with the world and thus the people in it. There are certain people in my life that I keep around because they nurture my being, they nurture and encourage me to keep doing my thing, and they overall offer the space for me to grow both individually and collectively. They are people no longer in my life because they do the exact opposite of that. I was either confused about who I was or I didn’t like to step into the parts of me that I’d bring up when I was around them. People who we interact with contribute to the shaping of our identity, which is why older people always tell us to watch who we call our friends. It is important that we know ourselves so that others cannot tell us who we are. To go back to the characters Mary and Clementine, not knowing themselves fully led their predators, Patrick Wertz and Stan, to view them as easy prey. Watching the film I truly felt so bad for both of these women, especially Mary because in her instance sex was involved. She wasn’t outright raped in a scene (fuck Showgirls for that), however her lack of knowledge in the situation pertaining to her affair with Dr. Howard and why she couldn’t help but like him, made her relationship to Stan feel so icky, so perverse. She didn’t understand her infatuation with Dr. Howard and in the end, she didn’t fully know if Stan knew about the procedure or not. Mary’s character was unfortunately an allegory of sorts. She is an allegory of what it means to not only have her memory wiped, but to also be vulnerable to people writing her story for her. Mary’s voice was essentially silenced in this whole ordeal. Upon further research and rewatching the movie, Mary in the end was coerced into having the memory wiping procedure. So this confirms for me that in my heart I believe Stan knew and was just lying because his friend Patrick did the exact same thing to Clementine and if he didn’t, he was complicit in her violation. Stan is a reflection of the idea that the company an individual keeps around also reflects their own character. To wrap up my thoughts on Mary’s storyline, she is an example of identity because when an individual removes a memory they are also removing a part of theirself. For Mary, while she was coerced no doubt, the memory of the affair taking place erased a part of her identity hence her voice. Her feelings surrounding the whole ordeal, her say in what happens to the truth (the fact that the affair happened) was stolen from her. For Clementine, the situation was a little different.  For Clementine, while a part of her identity was stolen due to the memory, the predator of her storyline is a man named Patrick Wertz. He works with Stan at the memory wiping clinic Lacuna. He has always liked Clementine and uses her memory wipe as an opportunity to become her lover while assuming the personality traits of Joel as his own. Patrick’s need to assume another’s identity in order to obtain the object of his desire, Clementine, shows a lack of identity as well as self hatred. Clementine is no longer human in this pursuit hence why I said object of his desire instead of subject. To me self-hatred is a form of dehumanization, especially when an individual hates theirself for something they cannot change or shouldn’t have to change. While in the process of pursuing his desire, Patrick dehumanizes himself and Clementine. It is quite clear upon our first encounter with their interaction that Clementine is not happy in the relationship as well as uncomfortable. She knows something is missing from her being; she is missing from her being. Who she was when she was with Joel was never processed so with Patrick trying to assume the traits of Joel, it brought attention to that blank slate in her brain and heart. Clementine is the example of the idea that no matter what a person does, what is meant to be revealed to them will be revealed ultimately and it is up to the individual to decide how they want to go about that. Clementine uses her free will by running away from Patrick, something that Mary couldn’t do since her free will was manipulated. These two women are foils of each other, especially centering the ideas of free will in shaping one’s identity and one’s ability to tell their own story. Identity is quite a complex being that is informed by memory and the connections in our lives, which is a perfect way to segway into our last and final theme explored in the film: connection.

Part three will be posted next week! See you beautiful people then!

– Azura Lee