(500) Days of Summer

Director Marc Webb discards chronological structure in relating this boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl saga about Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an amiable aspiring architect from New Jersey who works in downtown Los Angeles writing copy for greeting cards. When Tom's boss, Vance (Clark Gregg), hires a new assistant named Summer (Zooey Deschanel), fresh off the plane from Michigan, Tom is smitten. The pair like the same music (Bruce Springsteen, the Smiths) and share a similar artistic taste, leading Tom to blissfully conclude, “We're compatible like crazy.” Alas, the number in the title refers to the length of time between the day they meet and the day they part. It's a gimmick, as is the unconventional scrambling backward and forward in time, but the emotional interaction is engaging as the narrative explores past family divorces and contemporary workplace socialization, deftly using a split-screen in places to create empathy. Told from Tom's naïve point-of-view, this whimsical, bittersweet tale of love gone awry captures the heartbreak and misery of rejection, with Summer embodying the outwardly flirtatious free spirit who adamantly guards herself from commitment. Recommended. [Note: DVD/Blu-ray extras include audio commentary with director Marc Webb and costar Joseph Gordon-Levitt, deleted/extended scenes (15 min.), and trailers. Exclusive to the Blu-ray release is a “making-of” featurette (30 min.), a “Summer at Sundance” festival featurette (14 min.), “Conversations with Zooey and Joseph” with costars Zooey Deschanel and Gordon-Levitt (13 min.), audition tapes for Geoffrey Arend and Matthew Grey Gubler (8 min.), an interview with Webb (6 min.), a Fox Movie Channel segment featuring Deschanel and Gordon-Levitt (6 min.), storyboard to film comparisons (4 min.), a “Bank Dance” scene (4 min.), a “Mean's Cinemash: Sid and Nancy/(500) Days of Summer” scene (4 min.), the music video for “Sweet Disposition” by the Temper Trap, and a bonus digital copy of the film. Bottom line: an especially winning Blu-ray extras package for this fine romantic comedy.] (S. Granger)