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At the very beginning of the delightful, wonderfully bittersweet 500 DAYS OF SUMMER, we see a disclaimer that we're used to seeing at the end of a film's credits: that all of the characters are fictitious, and any resemblance to real-life people is purely coincidental. This is followed by an additional statement that will make people laugh, but more importantly, it sets a mood of acerbic humor that will prevail throughout most of the film. The laughs in 500 DAYS OF SUMMER aren't the belly laughs that you'd get from the average, gag-infested romantic comedy; the laughs here are punctuated with a sense of sympathy (and very often pain) for the main character... a guy. That's right: despite being categorized as a romantic comedy (which is arguable), 500 DAYS OF SUMMER is told from the male point of view, which is something we see so rarely.
This film is far too deep and observant to be considered a "chick flick." In fact, as the narrator says, and as you already know if you've seen the trailer, "this isn't a love story." That obviously depends on what your definition of a "love story" is, but the narrator's statement makes sense because 500 DAYS OF SUMMER isn't as much about the unfolding of the relationship between the two leads as it is about their extremely divergent perspectives on love, and how the clashing of those perspectives impacts both of them in very extreme ways. If this film were simply about "the story of Tom and Summer," it would follow a linear sequence of events. However, this movie is more of an examination of feelings within particular moments in time, and how these feelings can change so radically, which is why the film elects to show things out of order... BUT, for the love of God, don't let that dissuade you from seeing it because, surprise of surprises, the technique works remarkably well in this movie, as I'll explain later.
Although Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) studied architecture, he works at one of those Hallmark-type companies, where he's in charge of coming up with what many would think are the nauseating messages that we find in congratulatory and romantic greeting cards. He's a full-on romantic, and he's apprehensive about the possibility of never finding "the one." Tom's boss hires a new assistant, Summer (Zooey Deschanel), and although Tom is immediately struck by her, he's too shy to engage her, and it's not until a karaoke party to which all of the office's employees are invited that Tom and Summer, after having a few drinks, get to know each other on a deeper level. Much to his chagrin, Tom discovers that Summer doesn't believe in true love: "I don't feel comfortable being anyone's anything. It just causes pain." While she has a point, this doesn't deter Tom's growing feelings for her, and once they first kiss (in a cleverly staged and perfectly awkward moment in the photocopy room), they sort of come to an agreement: Summer warns him that what they have is "nothing serious," and Tom pretends like he's okay with that. The average movie would then progress to portray a linear sequence of the development of Tom and Summer's relationship. However, 500 DAYS OF SUMMER is better than that: it covers the "500 days" from Tom meeting Summer on day #1 to the film's final scene on day #500, but in the process of doing so, it will often go forwards and backwards between days. This may seem like it would be confusing. Why does it work tremendously well in 500 DAYS OF SUMMER?
The film chooses to focus on contrasts between the "stages" of a relationship, and in order to establish those contrasts, it's unnecessary to show the stages in sequence (in fact, as we notice during the film, it's often more effective to go from what happened later to what happened first). In the case of Tom and Summer, we realize early on that the relationship imploded right around day #300, so whenever the film goes to a day after #300, we know that the mood is going to be different. The best example of how effective these contrasts I mentioned are is an instance in which, first, we see something that happened in the later stages of the relationship, where Tom and Summer are at IKEA and Tom is joking about the dishwashers not working, while Summer is acting stoically... THEN, we rewind to the first few months that they were together, and we see Tom and Summer at IKEA messing around and pretending like all of the furniture is part of a house they're living in, and of course, Tom is on cloud nine during this entire moment. There's never going to be any doubt in the viewers' minds that Tom is submerged in his love for Summer; in one of the film's later scenes, he walks by her on a train without actually seeing her, but we can tell that he immediately knew that it was her. Unfortunately for him, Summer's focus on keeping things on a non-serious level doesn't bode well for the chances of the couple staying together.
While there is an enormous amount of emotional insight to be found in essentially every scene of 500 DAYS OF SUMMER, there is a sequence in particular that has to be singled out for its incredible brilliance. Just like the technique of showing events out of order, the "split-screen" technique is one I've never been a fan of either, because it's not often possible to keep track of what's happening on both sides, and there may even be a tendency to want to just look at one of the two sides and ignore the other. Such is not the case during a wonderfully fluid sequence in 500 DAYS OF SUMMER in which the left side is titled "Expectations" and the right side is titled "Reality." The sequence takes place during a party that Tom and Summer attend and, as you may have figured out already, the "expectations" part shows the way Tom would've liked the party to unfold, and the "reality" part shows, well, the sad truth. This segment of the film is put together in a way that it is not difficult to analyze what is happening on both sides: it is presented in a completely fluid way with perfectly appropriate music to boot. This sequence, combined with the pitch-perfect approach taken towards the way in which the days are shown to us, is evidence that the work done in the editing room was absolutely terrific.
Earlier in the film, there's a montage sequence which takes place the day after Tom and Summer first have sex, and it involves Tom happily ambling on the street. The decision to have the montage was appropriate because 500 DAYS OF SUMMER is largely about Tom's varying emotional states, but the way the montage is put together is one of the two small quibbles I have with the film. Put simply, it's too cute; it involves an exaggerated amount of dancing, and features Tom interacting with some animated birds, which are blue, by the way, which I suspect was done partly as a result of the camera's apparent obsession with Zooey Deschanel's eyes.
The other quibble I have involves the film's final scene. While the name that is revealed in the film's final line caused an uproar of laughter in the movie theater (and I admit was among the people cracking up), it's hard to ignore that it's a contrivance, and it actually seems like the type of contrivance that would beg for a sequel (which would be unnecessary - 500 DAYS OF SUMMER is a wonderful movie that needs no following up). Despite that, though, I do very much appreciate the film's sudden philosophical shift (which is made clear by the narrator) in terms of the "fate vs. coincidence" dilemma. The fact that this happens leaves the door open for interpretation, which means that everyone will not come out of the film having drawn the same conclusions.
While this film isn't entirely light-hearted, there are plenty of hilarious moments, which is why this is actually one of the most light-hearted films that Joseph Gordon-Levitt has taken part in, and while his roles during the last few years have been darker, that doesn't stop him from giving an emotionally devastating performance here; Tom's vulnerability is constantly palpable in every scene of the film. There's a moment later in the film (during a meeting at the office) when Tom's sense of disillusionment towards love blatantly manifests itself, and the moment could've easily been over-the-top, but Gordon-Levitt avoids that at all costs. Several of the reviews that have criticized Zooey Deschanel's performance have done so on the erroneous basis that Summer is an "unlikable" character. However, it should be noted that, since we're rooting for Tom to be happy, and Summer's stance on love is hindering that, it's not exactly going to be easy to LIKE her (though I did). So, to be fair, the sense of disgust may be more towards the character than the performance, and I think that Deschanel's work as the title character was remarkable.
On a personal level, I felt deeply engrossed in the conflict of ideas exchanged by the two protagonists due to their opposite views on love/relationships. I usually profess to share Summer's perspective that true love doesn't exist, that it's better to just enjoy things while they last, and that there's no need to find "the one" in order to be happy... but the truth is that I'm really a romantic at heart. That's the reason why, as I said last year in regard to IN SEARCH OF A MIDNIGHT KISS, this is my kind of movie: perceptive about relationships, emotionally searing, with characters who are more than compelling and easy to feel pain for. 500 DAYS OF SUMMER is one of the best films of the year.
8/10
