The strength of the production is something that is currently in decline in Hollywood: its good script. The plot itself is not very original, but what is surprising is the way in which the basic plot boy meets girl-boy and girl falls in love-boy and girl split-boy and girl happily ever after is told. And believe me: however trivial and repetitive this plot may sound; the ending will surprise many people. Director Marc Webb had only made two music videos, a short film and a musical for television. After (500) Days of Summer, however, he managed to sign on to be responsible for "The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)". And all this because he was able to confer verisimilitude and awaken an almost youthful attraction to the most commonplace of narrative arcs, relying on a lot of wit and intelligence.
Running away from a linear narrative, Tom's 500 days with Summer are exposed in a dispersed way, making the story even more palpable and organic. Without at any time, however, confusing viewers with the chronology of events, this clever move works in order to manipulate their eyes in the face of the situation and, mainly, make them even more indignant with Summer, the romantic partner of the protagonist and main antagonist. Of the movie. At least, an antagonism is supposed, since the argument has more to expose than simple black and white. At the same pace, director Marc Webb is extremely competent in making Tom a sympathetic protagonist. After his first night of sex with Summer, an extraordinary musical number appears that expresses very well the joy that the character is feeling. Ludic, the sequence has at its end an abrupt contrast with the far from happy future in which Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character finds himself in agony, finished; pitiful.
Thus, after the inventive and beautiful opening, to the sound of Us, by Regina Spektor, the director presents us with several montages that are far from conventional. The presence of a narrator (Richard McGonagle) is efficient, verbalizing some situations that needed to be verbalized, without leaving them, however, expository. Further, it is with the end of the relationship that Tom manages, even without wanting to, to overcome, even without wanting to overcome, the presence, and consequent, departure of Summer from his life. Meeting her again, on an unexpected occasion, all those feelings return. Good times are briefly experienced. Without understanding signs, Tom is invited to a party by the girl, and all the passion of the passionate, dreamy and confused young man returns. The conflicting montage between expectations and reality, naked and raw, is painfully bitter, but honest. Tom is a romantic, convinced that when the heart loves someone, that is destined to be loved forever, and above all, loved by him. Tom is wrong.
The audience's interpretation, considering the intention of the work, is more directed towards what goes on in Summer's mind, and not what goes on in Tom's mind, which we are already familiar with right away. Why would she have let Tom love her so intensely if she didn't share the same feeling? And why would she have created new expectations for the boy if reality would not match them? The answer is as simple to understand as it is complex to absorb. The good times that the two had really existed. The passion existed. But that wouldn't last forever. Summer suspected this, while Tom, young lover who once got "The First Night of a Man" wrong, did not. Why would this boy be different from all the other lovers she'd ever had? One day the answer came. For her. The excellent final dialogue between the girl of dreams and the passionate young man ties up the left ends, complementing the story's speech, which ends with the discovery of a new station.
For an analysis without passions, let's look at the story from three different perspectives: his, hers, and ours, and only then can we draw some conclusions. Let's start with his perspective. Tom is a single young man, raised amid romantic books and movies that idealize relationships as moments of pure perfection. Tom believes that one day he will find the one (in English, "the only one"), the perfect person, who fits all of his tastes and has the same thoughts as him. Then, on an ordinary day at his job as a greeting card writer, he meets his boss's new secretary, Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel), a beautiful young woman who fits all of his projections of the perfect woman, and he, is. Of course, fall in love immediately.
From her point of view, all these romantic projections of movies and books are fallacies and nothing more than stories far removed from reality. For Summer, life is much more than relationships, and passions are nothing more than fantasies created by people who are carried away by fleeting feelings. She stresses that she has never felt the way everyone usually says they feel when they are in love in any of the relationships she has had, and also says that this is not one of her priorities. Such a worldview completely escapes the stereotypes we see, where the woman is usually anxious and in search of a relationship, while the man flees from him like the devil flees from the cross.
There is a certain touch of comedy in this film. The men are on the worried and confused side, while the women - even Tom's little sister, Rachel (Chlöe Grace Moretz) - show much more security and maturity in dealing with their own feelings. In fact, one of the most striking scenes for me is between Tom and Rachel, where she says to her brother that "just because a pretty girl likes the same bizarre things as you, that doesn't make her your soul mate". This is a parallel that I believe we can all bring to our lives: who hasn't been convinced that that person was their soulmate just because they both liked the same style of music, movies or books!?
Looking from the outside, right away it is possible to notice the discrepancy between the ways of seeing the world of the protagonists, and that this relationship had no way of working out; but for our young dreamer, the fact that she said in so many words that she didn't want a relationship meant only one thing: she actually needed to be convinced otherwise, and he was the person who would show her what it really is love! Of course, because it's obvious that someone who has said in so many words that he has no interest in romantic involvement is going to fall in love overnight, isn't it? For many Romanesque constructs it is, and this is how Tom initially acts in his relationship with Summer. Trying to understand the whole situation, what we see when looking at it through his eyes is a classic projection of romantic ideals on the partner, where you don't see who the person is, but an ideal someone, nurtured by your own expectations, desires and even qualities you would like the other to have. Of course, each one has their own view of the world and this is independent of the state of enchantment, but when we are in love, we end up reading the other's behavior with distorted, biased lenses, which often lead us to much more favorable interpretations of the other. That they really are.
The scene in the park is the best materialization I've ever seen of the feeling when you're in love: you want to dance in the middle of the street, you're smiling, everything has more color, the birds sing just for you; it's that feeling that there's nothing wrong with the world and you are the happiest being in the entire universe. But, of course, this feeling of the character does not last long, since he exaggerates his perception and ignores all possible signs, letting himself go and starting to live more in his projections than in real life, deconstructing, in short, that feeling good and unique that had on the day of the park.
The villainization of the female character in this film occurs when we analyze the situation strictly through the male gaze, which, in this case, did not take so much into account what she said and focused more on what he projected. On the other hand, it is also possible to analyze the film in such a way as to villainize it, if we understand that she opened up as much as she could, but for him it was never enough. It's easy to say that Tom wanted more than Summer wanted and or could offer in the relationship, or even that she was mean and lying to him. Looking at history from just one side, or even judging by just a few frames, is seeing just one of the many faces of this complex relationship. This is precisely why we must analyze it from the most diverse perspectives, so that we can have the best possible view of the whole and realize that, in fact, when a relationship does not work out, there are not necessarily those to blame. As Summer herself says, when Tom asks her why her past relationships didn't work out: "What happened? The usual: life". Director Marc Webb's resource of telling the story in a non-linear way provides a much more interesting experience than if we saw the events chronologically. Seeing the ups and downs in a mixed way, we can see that both good and bad things were there, ready to happen. There is evidence everywhere. Life is complex and it is not always possible to turn feelings into words, and many times we see that their disagreements happen purely due to lack of communication.
Taking a lot from "Annie Hall", (500) Days of Summer is a celebration of passionate lovers, pop songs, romantic movies, romantic poems. It is not a love story, at its most youthful and puerile. It's a story about relationships and how good times remain good times, even if they can't be created with the same person anymore. In the end, no one leaves a relationship without learning, and we see this very clearly in the film, since both are, willingly or not, influenced by each other: Summer discovers that love is possible and Tom brings a little more of rationality and maturity for your life. Everything in life is phases, moments, and it's not always the other's fault.
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