Eternal Sunshine/Boyhood

Dual drawings to celebrate the anniversaries of a couple of the films that left the biggest impression on me.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind turned 20 years old this year, and I don’t know if you could’ve made it through the 2000s as a sentimental high schooler without feeling some sort of ridiculous connection to this film. The blend of melancholy and whimsy that was perfectly met by having Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet play opposite type. The aesthetic of a winter in Montauk. The way that sci-fi supports, without upstaging the human relationship at its heart. It’s weird, unexpected, and based on a recent rewatch, it ages pretty well.

Then there’s Boyhood, which turns ten this year. Probably not as widely canonized, but this film landed with me pretty deeply. The fact that production took place over 12 years. I am always drawn in by films that give proper weight to the passage of time and show you those things that are only visible in retrospect over a long period. I don’t know if anyone in film does that better than Richard Linklater. I remember those parting shots thinking, yeah… life is so many things. Hard, terrifying, hilarious, fast… but somehow it usually averages out to being beautiful.