The films that’re on my mind at the moment are Blue Valentine, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and (500) Days of Summer and oddly enough in both it’s about glorifying the end of love for our protagonists. I know there’re a lot of other films that take on the same story/themes/ideas, but as I said, just what I thought of first – and it helps that I just popped in the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind bluray.

A massive amount of cinema refuses to exist without having a romantic sub-plot, and as is known by most film lovers the hero must end up with his girl. So when a film comes around who’s sole purpose is for its audience just revel in these two people’s misery as it just doesn’t work out. In the real world we find so many excuses as to why a relationship just didn’t work: he was self-absorbed, she just didn’t appreciate him, or sometimes they aren’t ready to be together. These are tough truths to face when we’re experiencing it personally. However, give us a third party experience of the show and we’re lapping it up.

It’s almost like you’re watching your best friend dating their latest significant other and you’re happy for them, but you just know in the back of you mind that it just isn’t going to work out (read above for some mock reasons why). These films give us the ability to have that experience. I’d like to think that it teaches me what signs to lookout for to see if the relationship is heading in the wrong direction, but I know that it doesn’t really.

Which I guess leads me back to my main question: What is the appeal of these films? I can say that at times looking back at relationships that I’ve had that eventually came to an end I personally always find a way to look back on them fondly. Maybe the rough stuff are there, but at the same time there’re a lot of really happy and beautiful moments, which what I think is the biggest point brought out in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Yes Joel (Jim Carrey) is a depressing point in his life which is what has led him to getting Clementine (Kate Winslett) erased from his memory, but as he begins to lose her he realises more and more that he would prefer to have those memories stay there. We are our mistakes, and sometimes our mistakes are beautiful ones.

“Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.”