(500) DAYS OF SUMMER — ★★★★ — Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel; rated PG-13 (vulgarity, profanity, brief sex, slurs, violence, nude art); in general release.
It seems like the filmmakers and their unseen narrator are joking when they say "(500) Days of Summer" really isn't a romantic comedy.
But at the onset, it certainly appears that it might actually be one. The movie keeps morphing into other things after that, all the while ruminating on why romantic relationships have to be the be-all, end-all of our lives.
So despite our preconceptions about the material, in the end, this often-sunny "Summer" turns out to be a simple, refreshingly honest comedy.
It's also a project that boasts star-making performances for both its appealing young stars.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as Tom Hanson, a greeting-card writer who's unlucky at love.
However, he believes he may have found the love of his life. She's Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel), the new secretary at his office. They're both into the same things, including music tastes.
Yet Summer is holding something back from him and their blossoming relationship. And she keeps insisting that they're friends rather than lovers.
So it's no surprise that Tom's friends and family have been warning him that Summer might not be as perfect as he believes, and that the relationship is doomed. And soon enough, their predictions are fulfilled.
Director Marc Webb and screenwriters Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber keep shattering the narrative timeline, by jumping back and forth between earlier and later stages in the couple's relationship.
Thankfully, it's done in a way that doesn't feel gimmicky and instead helps us see the bigger picture.
Webb was also wise not to overuse the pop songs featured in the soundtrack (though a Hall & Oates-fueled fantasy sequence is pretty amusing).
Of course, what really makes the whole thing work are the perfectly paired stars. Deschanel is alternatingly adorable and infuriating.
However, Gordon-Levitt might be the revelation here. His performance is equal parts vulnerability and charisma, and it suggests that he could be a leading-man type.
"(500) Days of Summer" is rated PG-13 and features some suggestive references and language (innuendo) as well as some off-color humor, scattered strong profanity (including one usage of the so-called "R-rated" curse word), a fairly brief sex scene and other sexual contact, derogatory slurs and language, brief violence (a scuffle, involving fisticuffs), and glimpses of nude artwork. Running time: 95 minutes.
e-mail: jeff@desnews.com