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(500) Days of Summer

In the independent movie, “(500) Days of Summer,” by director Marc Webb, hopeless romantic Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) falls for his cynical coworker, Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel). Their roller coaster romance is told in a haphazardly non-chronological order, flashing from day 28 to day 488 and back again. Viewers are told from the beginning that this isn’t a love story, but, really, it kind of is. It’s a real-life love story, not that fictional fairy tale nonsense that film audiences are fed on a regular basis. The guy doesn’t always get the girl in the end – and neither does Tom. What he and Summer have is fun and painful, sweet and sour, just like real love stories.

The movie starts with Tom standing zombie-like in his kitchen methodically smashing plates on the floor until his adolescent sister (Chloe Moretz) comes to the rescue with vodka and a sympathetic ear. Thus, Tom begins his story of the beginning of the end.

He met Summer at the greeting card company where he works, despite his lifelong dream of becoming an architect. They bond over a mutual affinity for the Smiths and a drunken night of karaoke. They flirt playfully in Ikea and fight over some jerk in a bar. Somewhere along the way, they become a couple, despite Summer’s professed disbelief in love and boyfriends.

But then it all comes crashing down in a way that makes both Tom and the viewer doubt everything they’ve ever known or believed about love. Their unlikely romance comes to an end, like viewers have known it would from the very start, and Tom is left to figure out what exactly went wrong and to realize in his own time that maybe they weren’t really meant to be.

Despite not being a love story, this film manages to renew belief in the power of true love by the end, in a way that’s humorous and unsentimental, true to the tone of the film. In this film, Webb has managed to weave together a cohesive story line despite the seemingly random leaps through time. The story is witty and insightful and features a fantastic cast and a unique soundtrack. “(500) Days” centers on music, from the wooing powers of the Smiths to the impromptu dance number that Tom takes part in after his first night with the woman of his dreams. The diverse soundtrack features tracks ranging from Regina Spektor to Patrick Swayze’s “Dirty Dancing” tune, “She’s Like the Wind,” without seeming forced or irrelevant. The story is one that anyone can relate to because it’s real – real-life love and loss full of humor and despair, rather than yet another trite story of true love conquering all.

Written by: Casey Blackwell

Reviewers Rating: 9.5
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