Film #7 5oo Days of Summer

I was unable to produce an entry for today so my dear friend @FrequentLee lent me a hand and agreed on me posting the below review for 500 Days of Summer that was originally posted on his great blog . I do highly recommend watching 500 Days if you haven’t done so yet.

SPOILERS

Because I really want to discuss this film. I can’t get the formatting to be pretty, so because a large “SPOILERS” sign is needed, we’re just all going to have to suffer. More you than me.

If you’re trying to decide whether or not to watch it, watch it. At worst, you’re out a few bucks and a little under 2 hours, with another view on relationships. At best, you get a deeper understanding of relationships and realize that all people suck. And not in the “happy ending” type of way. The “sad ending for you” type of way. Which is the opposite, and not really an optimal outcome.

I knew very little going into the film, other than that it severely changes the dynamic of relationships upon being watched. The Ring for relationships? If you watch that film, your relationship will die in 7 days? Well, nobody scary will crawl out of your TV, I guess. Unless you ALSO saw that video tape, in which case 1) you’re just plain screwed and 2) you had a very, very busy night and I sort of envy you. You know, minus the “the spectre of certain death looms heavily over you.” That, not so much.

First Glimpse:

The lack of prior knowledge led to almost no expectations. The only few expectations I had were that the film would last less than 2 hours (it certainly did) and that it wasn’t some typical romcom (romantic comedy for the slow ones among you) or a typical “Boy Meets Girl,” as the narrator is so kind to point out.

Zooey Deschanel is not my favorite actress. I have no strong dislike for her, I just don’t see that she’s a big deal. She’s very plain in terms of acting ability and seems to always be the quirky, strangely attractive girl. Yet, minus the “attractive” for me. That being said, I don’t really like Joey Gordon-Levitt, either. Yes, I know it’s now Joseph. But you know what? He was on friggen 3rd Rock From The Sun and that’s how the credits rolled him, ok? So, I’m dating myself (because nobody else will! Ba-dum CHHHH) but you know what? I don’t care, because I’m ok with how old/young I am.

Despite their lack of acting appeal, I found that JG-L wasn’t terrible in his role and Zooey wasn’t awful. I don’t know that she’s a perfect fit for the female protagonist, as say, Tobey Maguire was the perfect fit for Peter Parker in the first Spiderman. Still, she’s no Kirsten Dunst, so I’m happy (YES KIRSTEN DUMBST WAS A BAD MARY JANE).

Throughout the film I didn’t really roll on the floor laughing. That’s ok, it’s not that kind of film. Maybe it was the setting, maybe it was the company, but I was ok with the rather artsy, indie-film type of feel. Normally artsy films make me uncomfortables and I don’t really “get” them. Or get them, either. But this one had more of a Juno-esque feel, a simple film with a powerful message for a golf-clapping audience interspersed with a few out-loud laugh moments.

Really, the film discusses the meaning of love and how people view love. Do I believe in love? All sarcasm and internet-persona aside, I truly do. I have seen too many variations of love to not believe in it. Like the flu, there are countless strains of love and even if you’ve toughened your body to the ravages of romance with a vaccine of “Never again” every year, somehow that bug sneaks back in and knocks you down flat.

Love between a parent and child – They say it’s unconditional but that’s abstract, intangible: how can you truly know the depths of such love? I’ve gotten a better idea by testing those limits and realizing that no matter what, my parents do love me.

Love between friends – There is a bond between people, no matter the relation. Between friends, that bond grows with every kind act and shared misery, maturing into a strong oak to lean one’s back against during the toughest of times. When friendships are tested, you’ll want a friend you can rely on, someone who helped plant that fine specimen of a tree. I’ve since seen the trees in that forest, as well as the insidious vines that trip you up, that grew in their place when my attention was elsewhere.

Love between lovers – no matter your orientation, love is love, separate from the platonic or familial sort. Love that exists in both this film and real life, when one human being loves another.

Is JG-L’s love any less real because he loves a woman who does not reciprocate? Does her inability to return his love in any way negate the love he feels? Before you launch into a rather dry and scientific discussion of hormones and emotion, let’s all understand that love is above all a feeling. A feeling that you can only feel in your body. Because outside of your body is air, and air can’t feel. So yes, hormones and emotions can combine to make up love. Just because your feelings are affected by the chemicals in your body, that doesn’t mean it isn’t real. Love isn’t a primary color, it’s a shifting, multi-color organism.

Zooey proclaims that she doesn’t believe in love, while JG-L is a firm believer in the existence of an all-powerful emotion that binds people together. At first, you think she’s afraid of being hurt, that she’s emotionally-scarred and that’s why she puts the distance between them. JG-L has never felt this magnitude of feeling for a woman before and is convinced of his love. He doesn’t have to fear being hurt because he knows it’s love; he recognizes that he loves her and thus opens his heart. Love can hurt, but because it’s love, because it’s so powerful and intoxicating, he knows he’ll be ok.

It isn’t until after the film, well after the film when you’ve sat down after packing all the rest of your things your friend was holding for you in his apartment, that the understanding of the film dawns on you. You see, Zooey was afraid, but not of being hurt by love. She was afraid that what she felt wasn’t love or that she simply was incapable. If what JG-L felt was real, if that was love, then how could she fail to feel it, too? How could love be one-sided and so uncertain?

Summer: I woke up one morning and I just knew.

Tom: Knew what?

Summer: What I was never sure of with you.

Probably the most epic and best line I’ve ever heard regarding love. Hands-down, a quality piece of writing. This line is the crux of the entire film, the lynchpin that holds this entire Memento-esque montage of relationship clips together. You understand here that Zooey wasn’t afraid of being hurt by love, but that she simply couldn’t feel love. She kept him at arm’s length, not because she was too weak to try loving him, but rather, because some small, minuscule part of her heart knew she didn’t love him. It’s like walking to an address you don’t know – If you don’t know the distance until your destination, your walk there seems longer than the walk back. Each step leaves you wondering if you’ve passed your mark or still have quite a ways to go. Once you’ve reached the end, you know the way back and it seems as if that distance is next to nothing. The length of it hasn’t shrunken any, only your perception’s changed.

With love, you don’t know it’s love until you’ve reached it. Every step along the way to love, you’re unsure – to date, this is the strongest you’ve felt. But as Zooey puts it, “what I wasn’t sure of with you.” What you weren’t sure of until you discover love, once you find it, you know unequivocally that it is true love because it’s so far beyond what you’ve experienced. All those uncertain steps where you wondered if you had come as far as you could go seem to vanish in the face of love and that certainty settles into your soul.

The other parts of the movie explore the relationship between JG-L and his sister, his friends, and the city he loves. Ironically, his firm belief in love inspires Zooey to hold out for love, true love. It’s her departure for those green pastures that disillusions JG-L, yet had he never believed in love so fervently, she would never have left and discovered love on her own. In the end, Zooey’s discovery of love shatters his own beliefs and then reassembles those beliefs into a stronger, more resilient shape. Those words she says in the end cut him deeply, yet if one such as she can find love and see it for what it is, then love must exist. And so, his heart heavy with regret and despair, he lets her go so that he can find his own love.

Final Glimpse:

Definitely an amazing movie and one of my new all-time favorites. It’s not overly pretentious and delivers on exactly what it claims it will deliver – rare in a movie, nowadays. The film doesn’t try to be bigger than it is, nor more profound, which I appreciate immensely. Unlike the complicated orchestral numbers that Hollywood so desperately puts out to fulfill quotas and squeeze money from unwilling movie-goer wallets, this film is a sweet, clear bell ringing out in the blazing cacaphony of modern cinema. Like a warm summer afternoon, the film’s heat falls onto the audience and soaks you to the core. Without the bluntness of most modern films, the soft, summer days of this film fill the air and pass the time.

Before you know it, it’s a change in seasons and the short but sweet story comes to an end. I’m left with a tender nostalgia for a love I never knew, with a woman I never met. (500) Days of Summer is really just a long set up for the final punchline, a witty, witty joke with just the right amount of cheese and the perfect amount of timing that all comedic geniuses know by heart.

Autumn. Her name is Autumn. God DAMN, but if I wasn’t completely blind-sided by that. I was the only one laughing hysterically like a maniac in that theater.

I have to give this film a 9.5/10. Just like in the movie, this film isn’t a true love (10/10) for me. But while I wait for the real thing, it’s both “interesting” and “fun to be with.” Sorry, Joey Gordon-Levitt, but it looks like you’re destined for second best. I’m taking off 0.5 because I think the casting wasn’t perfect. No, I don’t have better suggestions, but it’s a lot like a bad tan – something’s not quite right, but you haven’t got the foggiest clue how to fix it.