16 發光的城市 A R O U N D T O W N FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2009 • TAIPEI TIMES FILM REVIEW

arly in (500) Days of Summer the a winsome, accessible movie about more-or- structure restores a measure of the suspense Summer are employees of a Los Angeles to be an architect instead of a drone in a best- omniscient narrator who intermittently less recognizable young people navigating the that is usually missing from the romantic- greeting card company — leads to a few missed wishes factory. (and somewhat annoyingly) comments murky waters of post-sexual-revolutionary, comedy genre, which relies on climactic chases chances, a sweet first kiss and fitful progress One indication of the film’s thinness is that on the action cautions that the midrecessionary heterosexual attraction has to the airport and ridiculously contrived choices from casual to serious. Or so it seems to Tom, Summer has no such professional or creative movie is “not a love story.” The print a novelty and a measure of bravery working between rival mates. From the outset you know, an unapologetic believer in true love, soul pursuits — she’s the assistant to Tom’s boss Eadvertisements qualify his words, describing in its favor, whatever its shortcomings. And more or less, what happened between Tom and mates and other touchstones of greeting card (Clark Gregg) — and no identifiable passions, this slight, charming and refreshingly candid (500) Days finds just the right scale and Summer, so most of your curiosity is invested in mythology (and romantic comedy ideology). friends or characteristics other than her heart- little picture as “a story about love.” Which it tone, neither trivializing nor melodramatically the question of how it all came to pass. Summer is skeptical of such notions and refuses stopping desirability and her vintage-y dresses. is: a story about how love can be confusing, overstating the delicate feelings it explores. The answers, in themselves, are not to promise commitment or even consistency, Deschanel excels at playing this kind of cute, contingent and asymmetrical, and about how Some of the credibility that Webb’s earthshakingly dramatic or even especially but she does seem to want more and more of quasi-bohemian crush object, but after Elf and love can fail. Given all this, it’s somewhat movie establishes right away comes from unusual. A workplace flirtation — Tom and Tom’s company, and this leads him to believe Yes Man and All the Real Girls it would be remarkable that (500) Days, the feature its unassuming and appealing stars, Zooey that her carefully maintained barriers to nice if some smitten filmmaker would write directing debut of the music video auteur Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. intimacy are beginning to fall. her a fully developed, less passive part. , is neither depressing nor French. With his crooked smile, reedy physique The design of (500) Days suggests a puzzle Still, I don’t want to pop the shimmering But it is, all the same, a fairly pointed and improbably deep voice, Gordon-Levitt with a few crucial pieces left in the box. Some soap bubble of (500) Days of Summer, a movie response to the sorry state of romantic camouflages his magnetism with diffidence, of this elusiveness comes from an admirable that is, for the most part, as mopily, winningly comedy in Hollywood, which runs the gamut much as Deschanel uses her slightly spacey, (500) DAYS OF SUMMER impulse to respect the enigmatic fluctuations seductive as the songs on the from gauzily implausible fantasy to blatant vaguely melancholy affect to magnify the of desire and infatuation. But there is also sound track and at its best as unexpectedly and fatuous dishonesty, with an occasional charm she is pretending to disguise. Their DIRECTED BY: something tentative and half-finished about lovely as the views of Los Angeles captured detour into raunchy humor. The governing characters, Tom Hansen and Summer Finn, Marc Webb the film, which substitutes a few too many by Webb and his director of photography, Eric commercial calculus these days seems to be seem so ideally matched, such a cozily gimmicks — split screens, a musical number, Steelberg. At first, I mistook the city for Chicago that dudes want smut, ladies want weddings, compatible semi-hipster couple, that it’s a STARRING: that voice-over — for moments of real intensity or Philadelphia or some other old-growth and a picture (like The Hangover, say) that bit of a shock when things don’t work out Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Tom), Zooey or humor and seems a little afraid to make its conurbation, and Webb, who has directed delivers both will make the audience happy between them. Deschanel (Summer), Geoffrey Arend main characters too interesting or idiosyncratic. videos for artists as different as Miley Cyrus and the studios rich. Don’t worry; I haven’t given anything away. (McKenzie), Chloe Grace Moretz (Rachel), Instead they project a kind of generic and My Chemical Romance, deserves credit This dispensation means that more delicate, Webb and the screenwriters, Matthew Gray Gubler (Paul), Clark individuality, with shared tastes that ensure for finding new and fresh perspectives on this Gregg (Vance), Rachel Boston (Alison), and perhaps more authentic, feelings and and Michael H. Weber, have scrambled a measure of compatibility — they both overexposed metropolis. There are no beaches Minka Kelly (Girl at Interview) attitudes must be spoken about either with the chronology so that Tom and Summer’s like ! — and divergent quirks to or Spanish-style bungalows in the hills, just a subtitles or, from time to time, in mumbles. So meet-cute and their eventual bust-up occur, RUNNING TIME: provide some interesting friction. (Her favorite scruffy, comfortable atmosphere of melancholy in film time, close together and near the 1 hour 36 minutes Beatle is Ringo!) Tom, whose point of view optimism that suits Tom and Summer perfectly, beginning. What follows is a shuffled, teasing predominates in spite of the third-person in all their imperfection. and ingeniously structured presentation of TAIWAN RELEASE: narrator, has a couple of goofy pals (Matthew their romance’s heady commencement, TODAY Gray Gubler and Geoffrey Arend) and a wise ambiguous middle and (at least for one younger sister (Chloe Grace Moretz). He also ▼ and Joseph Gordon-Levitt star in (500) of them) tormented aftermath. This has the stymied, or at least deferred, ambition Days of Summer, directed by Marc Webb. Photos courtesy of Fox Movies

Love at the greeting card company: best wishes on your breakup The amorous co-workers played by Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt get it on and off in ‘(500) Days of Summer,’ a refreshing antidote to the facile humor and cliches usually found in romcom movies

By A. O. SCOTT NY Times News Service, New York

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