Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind: requiem for a pigeon

Title: Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
Year: 2004
Director: Michel Gondry
Running time: 108 min.
Country: United States

All Joel's memories related to his romance with Clementine are being erased. Joel tried to preserve his last memories of Clementine by placing her presence into his traumatic childhood memories. It is something like associate your credit-card pin number with amount of your first car park fine.

In one of his traumatic memories he was induced to hit a dead pigeon with a hammer. A short feathered appearance.

Details of the pigeon starring

• Source: Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind. Starring moment: 1:12:15
• Pigeon activity: None. It seems to be a dead pigeon lying on a trolley.
• Symbolism: I think that the pigoen is used to symbolize cruelty during childhood. It was probably  killed by Joel's little friends or maybe it was found dead. In both cases it is used to emphasize that this memory was a trauma that deserves to be kept in Joel's mind for his entire life. 
• Relevance: Low. Thanks to this dead pigeon Joel tried to preserve Clementine memories. Relevance is low because he finally failed.  
• Training level: None. It looks dead but probably it is sedated. When Joel hits the pigeon with the hammer  the animal is not seen. This is not a gore movie.