REVIEW: (500) Days of Summer

(500) Days of Summer (2009): Dir. Marc Webb. Written by: Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber. Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel. Rated PG-13 (sexual material and language). Running time: 95 minutes.

3 stars (out of four)

There’s a line in High Fidelity that goes something like, “Do I listen to pop music because I’m depressed, or am I depressed because I listen to pop music?” Not only does Tom, the Hopeless Romantic of (500) Days of Summer agree with the latter, he gives a rousing speech late in the film, throwing Hollywood movies and greeting cards into the mix, and accuses them all of poisoning the minds of our youth with lies of romance and love. But give the guy a break, his girlfriend just broke up with him 100 days ago.

The movie recounts a romance that begins in the office when Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) spots the new assistant, Summer (Zooey Deschanel) and falls for her despite her lack of interest in a serious relationship and her insistence that love does not exist. Some 200+ days later the relationship crumbles, leaving Tom devastated and at the mercy of his friends’ and younger sister’s attempts to comfort him. For the most part, the film intercuts the beginnings of their relationship with the final days, a structure that provides some fun contrasts between the initial bliss of new love and the eventual misery that follows. Once the earlier scenes catch up to the day of the breakup, the film focuses on Tom’s post-Summer days, which consist mostly of wallowing in a self-induced misery.

These scenes successfully capture the mindset of a young man blindsided by the seeming cruelties of the opposite sex, delving deep into the self-pitying world of one-word questions (“How?” “Why?”). With visual inventiveness, (500) Days of Summer turns familiar territory into something fresh and full of energy. After a very good first date, Tom joins an over-the-top musical number, complete with a choreographed dance and tweeting animated birds. Later, the film’s best and most heartbreaking moment comes in a split-screen with Tom’s expectations for a party playing alongside the unpleasant reality. From the mock-text that opens the film, assuring the audience that the story is not based on a real girl, (500) Days of Summer is a playful recreation of post-breakup suffering, accompanied by a killer soundtrack.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel are entirely at ease with one another, creating chemistry in their many moments onscreen together. Gordon-Levitt is especially charming, pulling the extra weight in his scenes without Summer. Along with recent films like Brick and The Lookout, Gordon-Levitt has recently been turning in strong performances in interesting movies, G.I. Joe notwithstanding, and is becoming one of the best young actors working today. Deschanel too, may be counted on for a likable performance; she’s given the difficult task here of continuing to be irresistible even in Summer’s coldest moments. She allows her to be a complex and inscrutable character, and if we never learn the exact reason for Summer’s change of heart, that’s only because Summer herself probably couldn’t tell us.

(500) Days of Summer succeeds where other romances falter by remaining honest in its depiction of relationship complexities, the constant balancing act of emotions, needs and the reality-check of life’s unpredictability. There’s an attention to detail here that makes the young couple so worth rooting for. But for all its authentic moments, (500) Days of Summer has its fair share of movie contrivances, both large (a convenient train ride to a mutual friend’s wedding provides an opportunity for a reunion) and small (I’ve never heard of a jukebox that has Pixies’s “Here Comes Your Man” but not “Born to Run”), but these moments are not entirely out of place in a film whose lead character is conflicted between a romantic belief in Fate and a nihilistic acceptance of life’s randomness.

After a breezy 95 minutes, the characters eventually decide on the view that everything in life happens for a reason, but the movie never explicitly endorses that belief. Life and love are what you make of them. Sure, they’re unfair, but maybe they have a way of coming around and rewarding the patient. Is such an ambiguous conclusion a satisfying one? The final shot of The Graduate, which this film shows in full, watches the two lovers’ smiles fade as they look around, unsure of their next move. Tom’s final look in (500) Days of Summer is, by contrast, much more assured and confident. Me, I remain unconvinced on the issue of destiny and randomness, but I’m happy that he’s happy.

- Steve Avigliano, 8/13/09