My Very Own Dream Double Bill

Szerelmesfilm (Love Film)
István Szabó (1970)

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Michel Gondry (2004)


I was given a wonderful and unique gift this Father's Day — a year's subscription to the British Film Institute's (BFI) monthly magazine Sight & Sound. This month's issue features a cover article about double bills — pairings of movies at repertory theaters or grindhouses that often were linked in some way, though sometimes were put together at random. For this wonderful piece, writers and critics and film historians were asked to name one dream double bill and to explain it. I am too young and have lived in to many nonurban places to have experienced an original double bill. I did see the fabulous Grindhouse movies by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, but the whole experience was contrived and not the work of a theater programmer. I have had many ideas in recent years for double bills of my own to watch with a group of friends. I even had a chance to try one of my double bills: Alien 3, David Fincher (1992) and Panic Room, David Fincher (2002); a then and now look at his filmmaking. That's one acceptable approach to programming a double bill, but I like the thematic approach the most. With that in mind, I submit my own dream double bill — Love Film, Istvan Szabo (1970) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Michel Gondry (2004).

I saw these films relatively close together in time and both on DVD — I knew immediately that they were made for each other. Love Film has a special significance to me because my wife watched while studying in Budapest and fell in love with it's unique story. I couldn't help but fall for the brilliant collaboration of Charlie Kaufman and Michel Gondry in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, I wish I had been able to see this on the big screen. This double bill is an ode to love's memory — its endurance. They are alive with the dynamic joy and sorrow of remembering. Distance and societies and even reality enhance the value and the liability of past love. Love Film's lovers are separated by the Iron Curtain at the height of the Cold War — Jancsi lives in Budapest and Kata in France. The lovers in Eternal Sunshine are on the brink of losing their memory of love though they share the same suburban Long Island community. Each movie weaves it's story into something that better resembles a dream catcher than a tapestry. Perhaps like a spider web, extending out in all directions, going back and forth through time. Istvan Szabo is able to convey the dream-like nature of memory using editing — scenes are repeated in different lengths and in no particular sequence — and sparse dialogue. Michel Gondry uses editing and his signature special effects — hand made props and mixing the real with the unreal (junk yard cars fall out of the sky around Joel) — to achieve the same goal. These films are beautiful partners, like the couples in each film, separated and different but perfect.

I have other ideas for double bills, like The Maltese Falcon, John Huston (1941) and The Long Goodbye, Robert Altman (1973). Try it, maybe, and see how two different directors at the top of their game at two different times take on the hard boiled detective story. I love to get ideas below for other double bills — think about and leave a comment. Both Love Film and Eternal Sunshine are available from Netflix.