One thing that's galling about being a lover of romantic comedy, given how bad they've generally been of late, is that you always feel defensive about recommending one. But here's the great exception we've been waiting for: (500) Days of Summer is a romantic comedy that doesn't require any apologies.
Perfect? No. Instant classic? Debatable. An enjoyable entertainment that's got enough substance to more than hold its own with any other movie released this year? Absolutely.
Don't want to over-hype a movie that's already creating a healthy buzz (since low expectations are the best expectations, I should just say "it's awful, but go see it"), yet I can't help adding my voice to Summer's well-deserved chorus of praise. I also can't help venting a personal "I told you so" re: why the movie is as good as it is, since its appealing attributes speak to issues I've been going on about, here and elsewhere, for years.
In Entertainment Weekly's current issue, the film's leading man Joseph Gordon Levitt nails one of them succinctly: "The relationship between the two characters in our movie felt like something that would happen in the world we live in, as opposed to some propaganda fantasy of Hollywood's to sell tickets." Exactly. And the unusually savvy screenplay by Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber is a testament to the power of utilizing the most crucial factor in this character-driven genre:
It's the characters, stupid.
The problem with your average studio-developed romantic comedy project is that it comes up with what's perceived as a hook-y comedic/dramatic situation... and then the studio tries to write characters into it.
Summer, like many a memorable character-named rom-com before it (Annie Hall, Tootsie, Arthur) takes the opposite tack: it starts with two credible characters - an idealistic romantic named Tom and a somewhat cynical free spirit, Summer (the incandescent Zooey Deschanel), who work at the same greeting card company - and shows how, because they are who they are, their not-quite-a-love-story is doomed to fail.
This is no spoiler - the romance's end is announced within the opening minutes of the movie and is implicit in the title. My point is that the collision between Tom's issue (he's perhaps more in love with the idea that there is a perfect One for him, than he ultimately is in love) and Summer's issue (she hasn't yet experienced the kind of romantic love that convinces her such a thing really exists) is what drives the story.
There's only a story here because of the unique people who pilot it. This is not, say, a wild-and-wacky mistaken identity farce, but a rom-com where the very real and distinct identities of its protagonists are the actual subject and dramatic fulcrum of the plot. Sure, plenty of funny high jinks ensue, but the movie's focus is on its lovers' inner lives, which illustrates another of my oft-blathered principles:
The good ones are about something.
You know what When Harry Met Sally... is about. Groundhog Day makes its theme abundantly clear. What's equally refreshing about Summer is that in a delightfully un-dogmatic way, it examines our contemporary culture's point of view on what love might be, and what commitment is or isn't. In that same EW article (sorry, the link's unavailable), director Marc Webb speaks to theme:
"Growing up in the post-divorce-boom era, we're more skeptical of marriage. Most romantic comedies sacrifice honesty for the sake of wish-fulfillment. The theme of (500) Days is that happiness lies within, not in the big blue eyes in the cubicle down the hall."
This subtext, termiting its way below the frothy, funny surface of the film, is what makes the whole thing meaningful. And meanwhile, Webb's directorial contribution should be acknowledged, as it illustrates another of my ever-pushed buttons about this genre:
Romantic comedies can be films, too.
One constant criticism I've made about even the better romantic comedies of the past few years is how bereft of visual style and distinctive cinematic storytelling they are (Judd Apatow, network television called: it wants its pedestrian camerawork back). Webb, a graduate of music videos, has finally given us a contemporary rom-com that snaps, crackles and pops with innovative and inherently filmic visual ideas.
He's done his homework, obviously - the film unabashedly borrows from both the French New Wave of the late '60s and its American imitators (e.g. The Graduate and the Woodman's oeuvre). But the film's energetic invention represents a compendium of the best contemporary techniques that videos (and cinema) have to offer, and they aren't arbitrarily applied.
They're evident in the movie's one musical number, two minutes of exuberant enchantment. Another gem, late in the film, is a neat split-screen sequence where on the left side, we see "Expectations" of a scene enacted, as on the right, "Reality" plays. It's an ideal marriage of technique and intent: we viscerally experience the contrast between hapless Tom's hopes and dreams and the way his real life unfolds.
Such stylishness enlivens the material in ways that only good filmmaking can, and finally, the collaboration between Webb and his writers illustrates how observing one more principle separates the garden-variety rom-com from the great:
Tweaking execution is the smart way to go.
Like a number of successful device-driven rom-coms before it, such as Bridget Jones's Diary (device: the diary) and Four Weddings and a Funeral (device: see title), Summer demands that its audience consciously participate in a game. There are 500 days to be dealt with, as an on-screen graphic consistently reminds us, and a good deal of the fun in the viewing stems from our seeing where we are in this near year-and-a-half period, as we hopscotch back and forth in time.
One of my favorite moments comes from inspired use of the device. At the end of that blissful musical sequence celebrating his seduction of Summer - which has been introduced by a low two-digit number - Tom bounds into his office elevator, looking radiantly happy. The doors close, and we flip to a three-digit number from the back end of our 500 days. The doors open, and there's Tom: infinitely miserable as he gets off the elevator to face a Summer-less office workday.
Here, in a matter of seconds, is a brilliant encapsulation of one of the movie's central themes: the ephemerality of romance - how everything that one loves about being in love can be everything one hates about it. And the moment comes out of having a concept about how the story's being told.
I'm going to stop my told-you-so-ing right here, since it's in danger of overloading with academic pomposity what's actually just a really fun ride. There's things to carp about in (500) Days of Summer (for one thing, Summer's character seems to take an uncharacteristic turn in Act 3), but far be it for me to snipe at the first non-guilty-pleasure romantic comedy to come down the pike in a while. I've been asking and asking for somebody in Hollywood to please make a non-formulaic, deeply felt, Real Thing rom-com that would transcend all the Old School hackwork, and this little movie amounts to answered prayers.
Billy, your review of "(500) Days of Summer" was GREAT. Makes me want to see it. Your review was better than paid advertisements. You gotta find out a way to captitalize $$ on that action.
"(500) Days of Summuer" isn't showing within 20 miles of Bonney Lake, WA. You can still see Star Trek -- but not this show. What's up whit dat? Rom-com consperacy? Perhaps -- but I'm not to blame.
Did just watch "Sufer, Dude" staring Matthew McConaughey. Thought about you, Billy Mernit, the whole time I was watching it. Wish you could have been in my living room with me when I was watching it JUST to watch your facial expressions. That thought makes me wax credit card commercial nostalgic. (Infamous Master Card tagline) "Watching Billy Mernit's facial expressions while watching 'Surfer, Dude'... priceless!"
Hopefully the rom-com upswing will continue next weekend with Katherine Heigl's "The Ugly Truth." The TV trailer totally sold me. Can't wait for that one. Now if our podunk theatres will just carry it...
- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA
Posted by: E.C. Henry | July 19, 2009 at 07:15 PM
Essentially, you're saying it's light on boner and bong jokes? How the hell did this get greenlit? Heads will surely roll!
I like Joseph Gordon Levitt he is a real surprise packet, looking forward to catching this one.
Thanks Billy.
cheers
David.
Posted by: Dave | July 20, 2009 at 01:09 AM
So you think this film will be better than Joseph Gordon Levitt's other summer film, GI Joe?
All kidding aside, I'm glad this movie is on my radar, and I'm Levitt summarized hollywood best when he reffered to it, and its view of love and romance, as propaganda. Most rom-coms are dfinitily unrealistic.
Posted by: Eric C | July 20, 2009 at 02:53 AM
You had me at:
"Judd Apatow, network television called: it wants its pedestrian camerawork back."
Posted by: romcom | July 20, 2009 at 08:39 AM
Yes! Han Solo was enough for me, but the entire movie was delightful. I underestimated the com of the Rom-Com.
Without sounding blasphemous, my roommate suggested (500) Days is this generation's Annie Hall. I probably wouldn't go that far, but everything that you said is so true. Characters, and a film, with character.
Posted by: Chris | July 20, 2009 at 12:27 PM
Apparently, Zooey D is also an amazing singer/songwriter as well.
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/oscars/2009/07/500-days-of-zooey-deschanel.html
Posted by: Erica K | July 21, 2009 at 09:46 PM
Billy,
Yours is recommendation #2 for this movie for me, and since you're both pretty smart cookies,I'm gonna go see it over the weekend.
(great post)
thanks!
Karen :0)
Posted by: karen from mentor | July 23, 2009 at 10:21 AM
Just saw it last night, and I'm with you Billy.
One point about the Act III Summer change up. View the scene where Tom takes Summer to see "The Graduate." Her response to the final scene of that movie surprises Tom. What is Summer thinking at that moment?
Perhaps she realizes that Tom is no Ben and she's no Elaine. Later, some guy in a coffee shop chats her up, and...[spoiler deleted], well perhaps that was the turn you needed in Summer's Act III shift?
Just a thought.
Again, lovely to read your take, as always.
Cheers, Mike
Posted by: Michael Maupin | July 24, 2009 at 08:50 AM
EC: Re: "Surfer Dude" - I be afraid, vewy, vewy afriad.
Dave: Boner and Bong - isn't that a new network sitcom?
Eric C: "Unrealistic" is a diplomatic, even charitable description.
Romcom: Glad to have had you (and nice handle you've got there).
Chris: Happy to have this film thought of as "this generation's" anything - since the better it does, the more Hollywood will pay attention.
Erica K: Yup. I'm a fan of her work with M. Ward.
Karen: Hope you enjoy!
Michael: Interesting. It's tough to discuss this without spoilers, so I'll just say... Summer's character in the body of the film is easier to empathize with than who she seems to become in the back end, which raises some questions about character consistencey. Y'know?
Posted by: mernitman | July 29, 2009 at 03:41 PM
Going to see this tonight, hopefully. Scott is a hometown local and we are all cheering for him. So glad you liked it!
Posted by: Scarlet Hip | August 08, 2009 at 08:41 AM
Finally saw it and although my companions and I enjoyed it a lot, we have two questions/bones to pick.
1) What IS she thinking in that Graduate scene? Inquiring minds want to know.
2) Tom was pretty well fleshed out; from our perspective, Summer wasn't. We know her parents are divorced and she doesn't believe in love and... that's about it. I can almost buy that we're experiencing her as he does - a mysterious romantic ideal without human contours - but I think that's a cop-out. She felt like a device for his character growth, which I think is not good enough in a romantic comedy (or, really, ever - although I admit I'm setting my mental bar pretty high on this one since the rest of the movie was much better than average).
Still worth the twelve bucks, though!
Posted by: Kate | August 15, 2009 at 11:14 AM
I believe that in the Graduate scene Summer is seeing a reflection of where she and Tom might end up.
Remember early on when Tom is described as being a romantic based on a misreading of the end of The Graduate? Summer suffers no such delusion. She sees the sadness in the characters' faces and dreads winding up that way herself.
Posted by: meetinmontauk.com | August 17, 2009 at 05:20 PM
Scarlett: Scott did good.
Kate: Re: 1) I was hoping someone might come along to articulate it better than I could, and meetinmontauk, below, hath nailed it.
As for 2) I agree - Summer seems more of a sketch, a thematic idea construct (w/some glaring inconsistencies of behavior in the back end).
meetinmontauk: What you said!
Posted by: mernitman | August 17, 2009 at 06:54 PM
I don't agree that Summer is a thematic construct. Isn't it one of the defining features of a construct that it's artificially consistent? And doesn't Summer, in the end, show a very human, very real contradiction in her behavior?
No, we don't know the reason for it. But that's because we're seeing the entire relationship play out through Tom's eyes. This is, after all, a very subjective romcom, much more than most.
In any case, I hope Hollywood gets smart and makes Zooey the new Julia Roberts (with her own enchanting twist, of course).
Posted by: Todd | August 20, 2009 at 03:02 PM
Your hit the nail on the head with your review. The highs and lows of a relationship inclusive of the internal dialogue that threatens our sanity when our expectations of a situation are quickly realized as just that...non-reality. The most freeing part of the movie in its own relationship to reality besides the fact that it is not your typical rom-com, is that it gives us an example of why people weave into and out of our lives...things fall apart so good things can be put back together in the case of Tom's dream of architecture. And as for Summer's character, the contradiction in her behavior isn't a character development flaw but rather a human flaw. Contradiction is stubborness vs. stupidity battling it out. Her stupidity was that she hadnt met love yet...
Posted by: Carrie | August 27, 2009 at 01:36 PM
Todd: You have a point. Nonetheless, I still found the whole "don't mention the other guy while I take you to a wedding" and the "don't tell him about what's happening while I flash my ring at the party" moves to be more narcissistically cruel than what we'd been led to believe of Summer. My own theory is that the subject of the movie's dedication may have been not quite so nice as the fictional Summer, and the writers' memories of the former may have emerged in the movie's back end.
Carrie: Glad I hit your nail. Meanwhile, as I was saying to Todd re: Summer, human, yes -satisfyingly movie character-credible, maybe less so.
Posted by: mernitman | August 28, 2009 at 11:23 AM
Saw the film recently. It's one of those where they leave it to play at theatres forever before going to DVD.
This film is worth watching not for the "romantic" aspect but for the films truth. It's theme.
What I saw was remarkably different from what you guys seem to have seen... Tom was a coward. Summer saw that and didn't want any part of it. Don't agree? Let me sell you on it:
When Summer met Tom, he had already been working at the card company for two years. He ignored his prestigious degree and shacked up to humdrum-dom. The very thing she came to that Town to escape. She was searching.
Tom saw and took a liking to her, but did he go up to her and chat her up? No, he and his friend sits there lambasting her based on their own assumptions. That's why he's floored when she comments on his music.
She's obviously into him. Notice how she enquired if he'd be at the karaoke? He's physically attractive. But would he step up to the plate?
His friend blurts out his interest in her, yet when she asks he denies it. She's now unsure of his feelings. He's sending her mixed signals and she has to 'man-up' and take the lead.
What girl wants a man like that? Not a girl who would travel from one part of the country to another in search of a better life. So naturally she tells him she doesn't want anything serious.
The one time he showed manliness was when he says "I say we're a couple!". Prior to that he humiliated her (and himself) by allowing another guy push onto her while saying/doing nothing like a chump, until the guy makes an insulting remark about her. She lost so much respect for him that she had to kick him out of her apartment.
She waits by the phone for his call but he's a chicken. So she gets up in the middle of the night and rain to see him. Would he grab and kiss her? Instead he rolls the ball right back into her court begging her to make sure her feelings never change. Had he ever asked her her feelings? Did he ever say his?
All she could do was wish. Even his baby sister told him "don't be a p#$$&"
He quit his job because he's angry with himself for punking out so often. He wanted someone to blame so he blamed cardmakers for denying people the ability to say how they feel. But even he doesn't believe that.
She goes to his park and tells him she's happy he's doing well. How could she see him as doing well when he's unemployed? He's doing well because he's finally taken action and made a career move. That impresses her. Finally! If only he had taken bold actions earlier, but alas, a guy in the coffee shop gave her that bold action that she had always hoped to see in him.
She cried at "The Graduate" because the graduate, a weird little weasel he might be, but an inactive coward he was not. Why could handsome Tom be like that? No, time to end this game that's going nowhere.
I think the reason this film played so well is because it's a true story. The script writer was telling his own story. Even in the end when he balls up and ask the girl out for coffee. He's learned!
Posted by: JamminGirl | September 19, 2009 at 12:38 AM
Jammingirl, you've absolutely nailed the psychological truth of this brilliant film - a truth the writers may have stumbled on accidentally in their decision to stick to the autobiographical facts of their experiences with elusive women.
Tom is a beta male. If his love of The Smiths doesn't give it away then just look at the mess of his life and his cowardice with women (something he doesn't resolve till the film's final moment).
Summer is right about him: he really is Nancy!
Posted by: Andy Conway | September 24, 2009 at 01:57 AM
Jammin & Andy: I agree with both of you - but I don't think many people are "missing" this aspect of the story. It's because the portrait of Tom is acute and accurate that I made no comment on it in my post; it seems clear that for Tom, the movie is a coming-of-age story where hopefully, he makes a transition from arrested development to the beginnings of maturity in the end.
What's less entirely clear is Summer's characterization, in that we mostly perceive her from Tom's POV. So she seems a romanticized ideal for the most part, and then fairly abruptly in the back end, seems far more narcissistic and even cruel than we (he'd) expected her to be.
Jammin, the only specific thing I see differently is Summer's take on "The Graduate," which is left wholly ambiguous. She could be... regretting that she's not in a passionate relationship like theirs, or she could be reacting to the markedly existential "now what?" that's implicit in the last image of the movie (which is featured prominently), implying that, especially in relation to her cynical POV and past, she sees such a passionate romantic story as impossible. Isn't willful ambiguity fun?
And Andy, I think you're spot on in your insight about the writers' accidental stumble - one of the great things about this film is that it sometimes (on a basic level) feels "unconscious," i.e. in part, it's felt instinctually rather than intellectually, schematically designed.
Posted by: mernitman | September 24, 2009 at 09:19 AM
I watched this movie last month with my girlfriend and actually enjoyed it a lot. This is very sensitive and delicate romance comedy, something to watch with your beloved ones.
Posted by: free movie | September 09, 2010 at 03:33 AM
I have seen this film and I think it's a very interesting one. There have been several romantic comedy films that has good plots but this film is different. There should be more films like this. Amazing review too. Keep it up!
Posted by: sunday solutions | February 01, 2013 at 04:40 PM
Thank you sunday solutions, I will.
Posted by: mernitman | February 01, 2013 at 08:45 PM