(500) days of Summer
One thing about Malaysian theater is that they censor everything and anything that almost seemingly portray inappropriate activity between a man and a woman, such as cuddling on bed or an innocent kiss on the mouth. I was at TGV cinema at KLCC yesterday to catch (500) days of Summer starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt (of 3rd Rock of the Sun fame) and Zooey Deschanel as the main casts. TGV is the only cinema to screen this film due to its limited release, but am astounded by the “strict” censorship by the Board. Come on, rate it PG 13 yet imposing the snipping game? We’re missing the gist here dammit!
So, (500) days is a tale of a modern love story -- well, an atypical love story, the parallels of a modern courtship in which million’s of twenty-somethings today might have chanced upon. In the mainstream of love stories, we typically find the boy-meets-girl, falls in love, breaks up and makes up in the end, where one could envision My Sassy Girl or You’ve Got Mail. However, this movie is not love story; in which the narrator prompts within the first five minutes of the starting scene. It’s a non-parallel tale of a love story, vacillating between days {23} to {480} to {1} to {358} from their make-up, break-up, and initial encounters.
The story goes like this; Tom is a greeting card writer, falling asleep at one of their regular brainstorming meetings sees newly employed assistant, Summer (from Michigan) when she interrupts her boss for a phone call. He immediately sets his eyes upon her and begins his journey to unravel the mystery behind her pretty and likeable face. They began having brief encounters at the office which makes him even more certain that he wasn’t the one for her. He begins the “She’s not just that into me” routine, basking in advises from friends and sibling to subtly stalking her in the office. Then on one beautiful chance, they meet at the elevator and she strikes up a chat ending with a common ground. It starts from there. And ends from there. We really never know what makes or breaks a relationship that we find ourselves rewinding over and over the moments we had with the past. That’s the beauty of a relationship...and this movie.
However, both of them view relationship in a great vast of difference. He’s the Lover with a capital L. She’s the cynic and a non-believer. They begin to seemingly have an exclusive relationship, taking shopping strolls together, have shower s*x, share a favorite spot in the offbeat of Los Angeles and shares her accounts that “she-has-never-told-anyone-before”. Thing is, she has been around the dating block to know she doesn’t believe in love. And she’s honest about it with Tom. She and Tom hate the term boyfriend and girlfriend because frankly, they don’t know what it means. They enjoy time spent together but it is one those moments when it hits you; an epiphany or a realization. At day three-hundred something, Summer began to cry at a movie date watching The Graduate. We don’t know why she cried. Tom doesn’t know too. Perhaps it's Summer's epiphany. The camera pans to the scene where Dustin Hoffman elopes with Katherine Ross in her wedding gown at the back of a bus, smiling blissfully to himself, knowing that this was what he wanted in life.
It’s all downhill from there. She has talks like "let’s just be friends" and "I'm waiting to be friends with you again" over pancake at a diner. Like a mouse hunting for cheese snapped on a mousetrap, Tom is frazzled, and really pissed. He loses it at his job and embarks on an anti-greeting card manifesto. He self-proclaims the useless means of cards for expressing real human feelings and subsequently quits his job to pursue his primary ambition of doing architecture.
At day {488}, Tom and Summer come about with emotional honesty, and at the fruition, reconciliation between the two main characters. All hope’s not lost, when day {500} dawns a new journey for Tom, a promise of happiness after a tough bleak trough. (500) days provides many unexpected twist, yet it’s a either love it or hate it feeling. The movie is whimsical, where there is a moment of a musical sequence coupled with animation, expectation-reality parallel scenes, with very ambient grunge-rock soundtrack. It garnered 87% approval on Rotten Tomatoes and 8.2/10 on IMDB.
So, (500) days is a tale of a modern love story -- well, an atypical love story, the parallels of a modern courtship in which million’s of twenty-somethings today might have chanced upon. In the mainstream of love stories, we typically find the boy-meets-girl, falls in love, breaks up and makes up in the end, where one could envision My Sassy Girl or You’ve Got Mail. However, this movie is not love story; in which the narrator prompts within the first five minutes of the starting scene. It’s a non-parallel tale of a love story, vacillating between days {23} to {480} to {1} to {358} from their make-up, break-up, and initial encounters.
The story goes like this; Tom is a greeting card writer, falling asleep at one of their regular brainstorming meetings sees newly employed assistant, Summer (from Michigan) when she interrupts her boss for a phone call. He immediately sets his eyes upon her and begins his journey to unravel the mystery behind her pretty and likeable face. They began having brief encounters at the office which makes him even more certain that he wasn’t the one for her. He begins the “She’s not just that into me” routine, basking in advises from friends and sibling to subtly stalking her in the office. Then on one beautiful chance, they meet at the elevator and she strikes up a chat ending with a common ground. It starts from there. And ends from there. We really never know what makes or breaks a relationship that we find ourselves rewinding over and over the moments we had with the past. That’s the beauty of a relationship...and this movie.
However, both of them view relationship in a great vast of difference. He’s the Lover with a capital L. She’s the cynic and a non-believer. They begin to seemingly have an exclusive relationship, taking shopping strolls together, have shower s*x, share a favorite spot in the offbeat of Los Angeles and shares her accounts that “she-has-never-told-anyone-before”. Thing is, she has been around the dating block to know she doesn’t believe in love. And she’s honest about it with Tom. She and Tom hate the term boyfriend and girlfriend because frankly, they don’t know what it means. They enjoy time spent together but it is one those moments when it hits you; an epiphany or a realization. At day three-hundred something, Summer began to cry at a movie date watching The Graduate. We don’t know why she cried. Tom doesn’t know too. Perhaps it's Summer's epiphany. The camera pans to the scene where Dustin Hoffman elopes with Katherine Ross in her wedding gown at the back of a bus, smiling blissfully to himself, knowing that this was what he wanted in life.
It’s all downhill from there. She has talks like "let’s just be friends" and "I'm waiting to be friends with you again" over pancake at a diner. Like a mouse hunting for cheese snapped on a mousetrap, Tom is frazzled, and really pissed. He loses it at his job and embarks on an anti-greeting card manifesto. He self-proclaims the useless means of cards for expressing real human feelings and subsequently quits his job to pursue his primary ambition of doing architecture.
At day {488}, Tom and Summer come about with emotional honesty, and at the fruition, reconciliation between the two main characters. All hope’s not lost, when day {500} dawns a new journey for Tom, a promise of happiness after a tough bleak trough. (500) days provides many unexpected twist, yet it’s a either love it or hate it feeling. The movie is whimsical, where there is a moment of a musical sequence coupled with animation, expectation-reality parallel scenes, with very ambient grunge-rock soundtrack. It garnered 87% approval on Rotten Tomatoes and 8.2/10 on IMDB.
Labels: movies
posted by Agnes Y at 14:11
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