Sundance Reviews: 500 Days of Summer
This isn’t your typical romantic comedy. Skipping around in time, from when their eyes first met, to the breakup and after, 500 days puts a new spin on how a romantic comedy should be. Zooey Deschanel (All the Real Girls, Elf, The Happening) and Joseph Gordon Levitt (3rd Rock from the Sun, The Lookout, Stop-Loss) star as Summer and Tom, two employees at a Greeting Card Company that fall into a happy but awkward relationship. Tom, the optimist of love, who believes in the one immediately falls in in love with Summer but the feelings aren’t returned as she tells him early on (Day 22) that she didn’t want “anything serious.”
Not knowing what she means by this, Tom is completely surprised when he finds himself standing in front of a naked Summer in his bed. After the relationship is consummated Tom takes a walk to work in the morning full of smiles and breaks out into a hilarious dance montage where he is joined by 200 of LA’s residents. Post breakup, Tom is comforted by his sarcastic but very knowledgeable 13 year old sister Rachel (Chloe Moretz) who tells him that if he wants to win her back he should “stop being a pussy.” Tom’s friends Marcus and McKenzie provide extra comical relief that should draw more men to see this movie.
Without giving too much away, the ending is happy and hopeful, not the desired result but one that makes the movie and the 300 days that Tom pined for Summer worth it once Autumn comes around. Marc Webb’s 500 Days of Summer is a movie that anyone could see and relate to. This is definitely a date movie, but it doesn’t have to be one that the girl chooses. 500 Days is just what people need to restore their faith in the fate of love and the the destiny that it chooses for us.
Tags: 500 Days of Summer, Fox Searchlight, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Love, Romantic Comedy, sundance, Tom McGrath, Zooey Deschanel