Come here/Go away

Rating: 10/10 (29 July 2010)

When the moon is in the seventh house and Jupiter aligns with Mars -- you get "500 Days of Summer". This is one of those rare films where everything lined up perfectly and the results are stunning. Where do you start with a movie this good? Anywhere!
Memories: They come to us out of order. We remember endings, and then we remember beginnings. We remember last month, then last year, then yesterday. Sometimes we revel in our memories. Sometimes they kick us in the stomach. And that is how this story is told to brilliant effect. Out of chronological order. And, from the front car of a speeding roller coaster.
This is a SWEET film!!! And it could not have been cast better than with Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon Levitt. Deschanel plays Summer Finn. She's alluring and desirable while maintaining a flat, detached affect that only makes her more desirable to all who come in contact with her. Words float from her mouth when she speaks as if to denote a subtle indifference. Holding her hand could cause yours to feel empty. Like holding the hand of a ghost. It's her way to be there, and not be there. She likes it that way. It's safe.
Deschanel is brilliant at this and totally believable as Levitt's, unattainable, object of desire. Levitt is wonderfully lost in love for this "perfect" girl. He is confused, bedazzled, and depressed - he's in love. He navigates all of the roller coaster stages of his characters head on collision with love with deftness and poignancy. I can not imagine any two other actors doing this movie greater justice.
There are so many good moments in this movie it might be inappropriate to single out just one over the plethora of others. But I will anyway. It is a beautifully subtle scene with Summer and Tom sitting in a theater watching the final scene of the movie "The Graduate" with Dustin Hoffman and Katherine Ross. Hoffman and Ross have escaped the chaotic world around them. It's just the two of them now, holding hands, moving ahead into the sunset. Seeing this, Summer (Deschanel), becomes emotional, surprising both herself and Tom. What happens in those few moments is at the heart of this film. And it's importance could almost go by unnoticed because it's done so delicately. As this moment is unfolding we already know everything about Tom. He has no secrets. From the start of this film his chest cavity is wide open with his beating heart on full display. Summer, on the other hand, is all secrets. But when the clock strikes this moment, we learn one of them. It's sweet. It's sad. It's revealing. And, I thought, very powerful because it changes everything we think we know about her up to this point. It also sets up perfectly the beautiful, but perhaps not "happy", ending that is soon to come.
In the opening credits, the narrator explains that this is a "boy meets girl" story, but that it's not a "love story". Well, I don't know about that. I think this is a love story. And a good one. The script is genius. The direction is sharp but never heavy handed. The music plays through the action in perfect accompaniment with the story. There is nothing not to like about this gem. Everyone in the world has lived through this relationship at some point in their life. It's the one that makes you stronger, as it almost kills you. Yes, that one. Here's what it looks like as a movie. A good movie.