One look at this poster tells you everything you need to know about the relationship between Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel) and Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Tom, always struggling to reach out to Summer and her carefully polished demeanor. Constantly pulling Tom in while simultaneously locking him out.
One important example of this I can list, because it's in the trailer anyways, so I'm not giving anything away (Note to Theo:
not giving anything away). Summer tells Tom she thinks they should break up, because they're always fighing.
"Bullshit," he responds. Then a surprisingly fresh version of a typical Sid and Nancy joke.
The movie begins in a very
Romeo and Juliet-esque way, with a baritone voice foretelling the outcome of their relationship right from the very start. The movie begins on day 290 of the 500, when all is not well between the title character and the leading man, and jumps around to important days in their relationship from there.
This movie shows how different the perceptions in a relationship can be- the little things you brush to the back of your mind when it comes to a relationship, and the little problems you just can't seem to let go when it comes to that same relationship.
The music is amazing. That I was expecting- a little annoying how Tom acts like it's the most wonderous and rare thing in the world how Summer likes the Smiths. It's not that rare of a quality. But as my sisters boyfriend pointed out- people who like Tom always think their qualities, good or not, are rare.
His is a bit like one of THOSE guys- brown jackets, I call them. They hang out in Starbucks or some "local" coffee shop reading some
Tolstoi, or writing into the
New Yorker. You know the kind I mean. He also takes advice from his "super annoying little sister who is wise beyond her years". I put that in quotes because it's such a clichè type of character, and she wasn't needed. His guy friends were enough and much more realistic. Plus as a little sister myself, I'm so sick of the steryotype.
As for Zooey Deschanel, she is
constantly in blue. There is literally one scene where she is not wearing blue. It got a little old after a while, and it kind of got you thinking that the director was kind of in love with Zooey a bit- like Baz Luhrman and Nicole Kidman kind of deal.
The dialouge is quick and upbeat, a lot of it is a bit overly trendy, but that's to be expected. It had me laughing a lot and there were so many endearing and quirky scenes. Tom has a spectacular,
Enchanted- like romp through the city, dancing and interacting with the people around him. It was a scene that really energized the whole movie.
I also love how they didn't dress this up too much, we saw the flaws in both people. Emotionally and physically. One scene has Zooey going through the rain, and when we see her, her hair is frizzy. This means a lot to me, a girl with curly hair who is constantly at battle with the frizz. But even super straight hair has no chance in the rain- Hollywood never seems to catch on to this rule.
This movie isn't perfect, but like the baritone voice tells you in the first few seconds, those first few make or break seconds, this is NOT a love story. It's a story about love.
-CE
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