At the Movies: (500) Days of Summer
I am no film buff. I am an expert in nothing but my own experience, but this film rocked my world. I want to see it again. I want to own the DVD. I won’t emulate the youth of today by bandying about terms like LOL, ROFL or PMPALWROFLOL (Peed My Pants A Little While Rolling On Floor Laughing Out Loud, that’s my own one there) – I actually laughed out loud, frequently. But then I love quirky, offbeat humour, sharp scripts and unusual characters. This move did for me what Juno did: made me forget about myself and my life and feel the atrocities of love and heartbreak, discover new levels of awesome – and, of course, want to get my hands on the soundtrack.
Boy meets (adorable, whimsical) Girl. Falls in Love with a capital “L”. Girl dumps Boy and breaks his heart—a story told through his memories of their 500 days together in an effort to unravel where it all went wrong. A non-rom-RomCom? A post-modern love story? No, from the get-go we are told that “This is not a love story. It’s a story about love.”
I fell head over heels for Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), the jaded greeting card writer-slash-aspiring architect. He’s so willing to fall in love, in all its breathless, fate-ascribing expectation vs reality, mess and joy. Summer (Zooey Deschanel), however, the eternal pragmatist, does not believe in such constructs, refuses to play the game, and is disarmingly upfront about it. With any other actress I would immediately have developed an easy loathing for her heart-crushing abilities, yet she is still likeable. Loveable even. This is real.
I enjoyed the reversal of stereotypes: a weak-kneed male and the no-strings, casual-only female. The cinematography felt raw and realistic, not over-orange and airbrushed. It was funny in so many places, unpredictably so, with an intelligent script, brilliant characters (notably the Buddha-wise younger sister), delicious vignettes and the highlight for me—a synchronized dance sequence, carried out to perfection. The unsettling nature of a non-linear narrative echoed the unsettling sensations of confusion, prompting feelings of both love and loathing for one person at the same time alongside Tom.
The happy (maybe) ending was unexpected in its form, and ultimately funny and hopeful. Heartbreak suddenly appeals to me and the vitality of overcoming it leads to Tom’s change in direction. I am always willing to live vicariously through stories such as this.
Hannah Campbell
(500) days of summer (M). The next screening at The Village Theatre will be held on Sunday 6 December at 5pm.
