50 First Dates, By Drew Barrymore

In “50 First Dates”, Drew Barrymore portrays an amnesiac who suffers from Goldfield’s syndrome, which is similar to short term memory loss. Everyday that Barrymore’s character wakes up, she has no recollection of anything that happened from after her accident. Regardless, Sandler’s character falls in love with Barrymore, and tries to persuade her to fall in love with him despite her memory problems.

In the film, Barrymore is told by her neurologist, that she has what is coined “Goldfield’s syndrome”. There is no such thing as Goldfield’s syndrome. It is is a order that Hollywood invented. However it is very similar to short term memory loss. Wo types of memory loss syndromes that are closely linked to “Goldfield’s syndrome” are Organic Amnesia,
Barrymore’s character cannot truly love him because she cannot even remember a day with him. It is shown that she somewhere she can recall the memories and feelings she gets with him because she constantly paints pictures of him, even though she does not realize who he is, and that he was her lover. She says “I don’t know who you are henry, but I dream about you almost every night.” This was the instance that suggested that small pieces were being transmitted to her long-term memory but not enough to make her aware of who he consciously is. Lucy is able to make an emotional connection to Henry.Anterograde amnesia is difficult because the new memories were stored for her, but she cannot access them. Interestingly enough, patients can still be connected by these memories in different ways. For Clive Wearing, he didn’t realize his children were his children, but he did however, remember his wife, after many decades. He never showed signs of being surprised when she visibly aged. He also was never shocked when he looked in the mirror and saw how much he aged. Wearing could play the piano, but when he was asked to play on the spot, he played without missing a key. Lucy is able to accept her new life, as did Clive, and come to terms with the people in it, even though she cannot remember any new memories or their relationships to her over time. If Lucy suffered from anterograde amnesia she would not re live her same day of the accident over and over. She would be able to accept that time has passed by, and not question what day it