Pajiba

500 Days irked me for other reasons:

-Why was that (unrealistic) greeting card job so terrible? Looked pretty super to me.

-Dorian Gray & The Smiths? That's what like, the FIRST indie fantasy chicks read & listened to.

-The supporting characters were Wack City.

-I'm 31 & jaded, & wouldn't much put up with people like Summer & Cobra Commander. Take your dreams & shove 'em! Haiti's a pile of rubble, you aren't an architect, the world is a vampire.

This oddly reminds me of a Nora Roberts book, Blue Smoke, where the main character is an arson investigator. Initally my reaction was that I figured at some point, she would fall into the role of the submissive female and the male character would ultimately save her (and the day), even though she was a cop and he was a very affable and laid back carpenter. I mean, that's how almost every other book/movie/story used to be, right? Guys saves the day and gets the girl. It's what used to piss me off about romance novels and movies in general.

But that's not what happened. I remember (happily) how much I liked how the fact that the man wasn't in the least bit emasculated by her profession or her persona, nor was she ever portrayed as wishing she could do something else with her life. I found myself rereading passages from the book replacing the 'her' pronouns to 'him' just to see if the character would hold up in more conventional male/female roles, and by golly, it did.

Based on this post, I get the sense that a lot of people still want to see conventional roles for men and women and have a hard time understanding just how much times have changed. A woman who is just not into relationships? She must be damaged, or a badly written character. Based on the comments some readers posted on a review of the book, there are plenty of women who do not 'believe in the Women's Movement' and, to paraphrase, just want a man to take care of them. Seems to me there's a lot of guys out there who still can't wrap their brains around the fact that there are plenty of guys out there that obsess over relationships. Sucks to be them.

and by them, I mean, the people who think guys have to be strong and women can't be one-dimensional.

I would agree with you 100% except for that "you bitch" on the title card at the beginning of the movie. Even if the movie itself is not misogynistic, the fact that the screenwriter felt the need to call his ex a bitch in front of, basically, the entire world just soured a lot of the film for me. I don't care if he thinks his ex is a bitch, he gets to, but calling her out like that should pretty much guarantee him the Oscar for Passive Aggressiveness.

Also I wanted to grab Tom by the shoulders and shake him until he grew a pair more than a few times. OK, Summer did not handle that break-up with grace (I felt like she was trying too hard to have a "good" break up when she really needed to just cut contact) but seriously, there comes a point where the only one making you miserable is you.

I watched this on Monday night and was pretty charmed by it. I thought Summer's character definitely lacked depth, but I never once thought the film was misogynistic. A little bitter perhaps, but that's sometimes the result of a collapsed relationship and smashed expectations.

I really enjoyed that. I can't offer anymore than that as I haven't seen the movie, but I really enjoyed that.

While I completely agree with you, COMPLETELY, that this film, from Tom's point of view, depicts a complicated (yay!), sometimes conflicted, but ultimately strong woman who is not fully fleshed out because she IS Tom's fantasy-girl. His construct.

BUT, I wish oh wish oh wish he had some female friends or some female character other than his highly hilarious but totally preposterous and somewhat Juno-esque precocious sister. The guy friends were great, GREAT. But maybe some chick somewhere. Most fully functioning (or mostly functioning, sorry Tom), adults have adult female friends. Female friends they consult about their girlfriends! The dudes were great, but one other chick would have been better.

But no, NOT misogynist. I loved it. LOVED it.

P.S. Stephenie Fucking Stupid Meyer is a mysoginist in that, I assure you she has contempt for women. She may not know it, but no one with any credible belief in women as strong, atonymous, intelligent, interesting beings could construct and REVERE that abusive MESS of a relationship. That drippy heroine. That jackhole "hero." It makes me sick and I think it damages young girls.

Levitt’s character in (500) Days was refreshingly NOT awarded the girl in the end.

Ummmm. Did you miss Autumn? No? No? Just checking.

Haiti's a pile of rubble, you aren't an architect, the world is a vampire.

Posted by: the new transported man at February 3, 2010 2:19 PM

Brilliant.

Also, I'm bored with Zooey De(change the)chanel, so I haven't seen this yet. Seeing all the people with strong opinions about it has changed my mind, though. (And JGL makes me giggle)

This article helped me to articulate many of the things that I was feeling about the movie. If you listen to the commentary track, it is difficult not to see how introspective the writers are. I think the issue Faraci has is complacency; a lot of filmmaking shortcuts were inverted for this movie, such as the supporting character who is wrong about everything and is therefore allowed to say wrongheaded things and thereby contrast the righteousness of the mian character. Here, the supporting friends do not play that role; instead, the protagonist himself is the one who is consistently wrong.

This is a movie that deliberately defied expectations; despite the assurance that "this is not a love story" we expect it to be a movie about vindication, ending with Tom proving to Summer that she is wrong about love and, ultimately, winning her over. Instead, this is a movie about self-discovery and how you don't get what you want until you realize that you were wrong about what you wanted in the first place. This happens twice, as a matter of fact: Summer realizes she was wrong about love and, when she does, she gets a happily-ever-after with the man of her dreams; she just does it off-camera, in her own narrative, in a parallel movie that we don't get to see. (500) Days is Tom's narrative track and Summer's growth occurs independently of his, so of course we see the outcome but not the journey. That isn't misogynist, it's feminist; that the writers and director did not feel the need to spell this out and show us Summer's story as well perhaps gives the majority of the viewing audience more credit than they deserve.

So here is where I intended to return to my thesis statement, that a critic unable to see this discrepancy with standard tropes of the genre is too lazy to accept deviation from expectations. Instead, I will modify my thesis: these critics suffer from cognitive dissonance. Tom is so realistically developed that the viewer resonates with him; however, in the end, Tom realizes that he was wrong and moves on, and at that point surpasses any viewers that thought they were represented by the protagonist but are not, themselves, capable of admitting their own shortcomings. Cue Regina Spektor on the soundtrack, we're not always the hero of our own story.

This was such a great peice. I haven't seen the movie so I really can't offer up any opinions or analysis, but this was a really brilliant article. I come here for the scathing reviews and the bitchy community but articles like this keep Pajiba new and fresh and exciting. Thanks guys.

Sigh.

- Female character isn't the heroic lead = clueless male supremicists continuing the phalocracy.

- Male character responds to female character negatively at all = oppression and metaphorical rape.

- Major female character isn't perfect & heroic in every way at all times = mysogeny.

Where's the right, and expectation even, that women are strong enough to also be flawed. It's the most patronizing thing in the world to be denied the right to be imperfect.

Seems to me like the male rushing-to-defenders are a tad mysoginistic in their blanket assumption that women need them to recognize & fix every supposed affront. Poor, delicate darlings, can't look out for themselves, or something. Seriously, WTF?

Then again, it's a common strategy. Not up to a relationship with a real person, they diminish the object(s) of desire & need down to something they can handle - damsels in distress. Who hates women again?

Yeah, sound argument, and I enjoyed reading this piece (as well as the comments that followed).

I still don't think the movie is that great. I agree with some above that the supporting characters needed more. I also guess I just wanted more texture to both Summer's and Tom's characters. It's a good point that our superficial view of Summer fits with Tom's projections and thus works thematically, but I think that perspective of Tom still could be conveyed in concert with actually fleshing her out a bit more. A little more texture to Tom that goes beyond the Summer obsession and the greeting card/architect dichotomy would have helped too. I'm not even talking about anything major - just little details that go beyond pop culture references and could have made the characters feel more real. For me, that probably would have taken it from a good movie to a great movie.

"If not being in love with someone you’re dating is cruel, or makes you a bitch, then that means that a whole hell of a lot of us have been cruel bitches at one point or another in our lives."

Actually, I would argue, that YES, many of us HAVE been cruel bitches as some point in our lives. Off the top of my head, I can think of at least three times when I have knowingly been a cruel bitch of this vein. The important thing is that I LEARNED. I learned that its really not okay to be involved with someone who isn't on your page. However, this movie, I felt, glamorized the exact opposite of that idea.

Tom's situation is what I like to call the George Clooney dilemma; George continually becomes involved with these women who are clearly more into him than he is into them. And everyone knows it...he knows it, she has to know it, the National Enquirer knows it! But they stay because even though they are almost certain to be dumped in a rather embarrassing fashion (see Sarah Lawson, Lisa Snowdon and Elisabetta Canalis in about three weeks), it's George-frickin'-Clooney! You'd be nuts not to take even a million to one shot at getting married to the guy, right? Especially if you are a cocktail waitress, some small time reality TV show host, or...well...whatever the heck Elisabetta calls herself. So while I don't necessarily approve of these woman getting into these relationships (anymore than I did of Tom dating Summer), I do empathize with their plight. And I also believe they tend to learn after the fact...when was the last time you saw Sarah Lawson in the news?

However, it was my impression in this movie that Tom learned NOTHING from his experience. He even admits when he meets Summer on the park bench that he didn't understand her actions, like he continues to think she had some huge ulterior motivation behind dating, using, dumping, and embarrassing him in public (i.e. he still has his "fantasy view" of their relationship). She didn't, dude! She didn't do it because she likes you or because she hates you! She did it, literally, because she DIDN'T CARE ENOUGH ABOUT YOU EITHER WAY TO NOT DO IT! Not caring gave her power, and, like most un-evolved humans tend to, she used it. End of story.

Now, let me be clear: I do NOT think the movies is misogynistic in general and especially not for portraying Summer in this way. I think this happens to all of us; it's a stage of human emotional evolution and we have to go through it. Everyone needs to learn that just because we CAN do something to someone doesn't mean we SHOULD. I think this is an important component of the empathy concept, and one that we can only really grasp with serious introspection into our own actions and emotions. This idea also hearkens back to my George Clooney example; I have little to no empathy for him when he has women trouble, because he knowingly leads these women down a path that will surely not go well for them without a thought about it. (Truthfully, it colors my entire view of him as an actor, and I don't think I enjoy his movies as much as I would if he was less arrogant in his private life.) Additionally, Summer does not appear to learn this lesson at the conclusion of the movie either. I think Summer and the movie portray the antithesis of this lesson: "Hey, attractive ladies! Go ahead and do whatever you want, cause in the end, you'll marry a nice guy and get a huge rock anyway! Whoo hoo!"

As I said in my original post-o-rage about this movie:

"All that movie did was glamorize being out of touch with yourself and hearing only what you want to hear...not two things that need to be encouraged in a country where the divorce rate is trending to 50%."

In the end, nobody learned anything about themselves, but still got what they wanted: Summer got to get married to some dude she liked, and Tom got to start another fantasy relationships with his new female archetype (sexy-well-put-together-architecture-red-head). It's just not what I think a critically acclaimed movie about the "reality" of a relationship should be, and it frustrates me to no END to hear people hold it up as such. And that's why I don't like it.

I will add to the chorus of praise: This was thoughtful and well written, and I love the way you engaged the criticism coming from other reviewers and took them to task for sloppy and illogical positions. I hope we see similar pieces in the 'Pajiba Advocate' vein in the future. This is the type of writing that sets Pajiba apart, and keeps us loyal. (I speak for myself, but I don't think I speak just for myself)

Sigh.

- Female character isn't the heroic lead = male supremacists & the phalocracy.

- Male character responds to female negatively = deliberate oppression & metaphorical rape.

- Female character isn't perfect, heroic & successful = misogyny.

Where's the right, and expectation even that women are strong enough to handle life's bumps and grand enough to also be flawed? It's the most patronizing thing in the world to be denied the right to be a douche. Treated like you can't handle your own life is a close second.

Seems to me the male rushing-to-defenders presumption that women need help to recognize & fix every affront would be ... a tad misogynistic? Certainly patronizing. Poor, delicate darlings, can't look out for themselves, or something. Seriously, WTF?

Then again, it's common. Not up to a relationship with a real person, they diminish the object(s) of desire & need down to something they can handle - images of damsels in distress & not people. So, who hates women again?

It's the same twisted "reasoning" that led to claims of "misogyny" around Dr. Horrible. Of the three leads, only Penny is 1) Dealing with the world as it is, and 2) Owning her own agency in it. Meanwhile both male characters deliberately retreat to stylized roles and deny their responsibility for what they do, literally singing: "A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do."

Sheesh.

Forget Summer, I'm just glad to see that someone besides myself found Pretty Woman to be misogynistic.

I can't tell you how many women I mentioned that to who were incredulous that I would say such a thing. I was so shocked at how brazen it was that I was angry on behalf of women. Ironically, I only saw it because a female friend of mine insisted that we see it.

goddamn, NotesOnMyBathroomMirror, that was a nice post.

NotesOnMyBathroomMirror

But do you really think that the movie implied a happy ending for both characters? I didn't necessarily get that. I know some people (you, Diest) criticized the fact that Tom doesn't really learn anything but gets paired up with a new fantasy girl in the end. Granted, that gives the character an "up" trajectory but it doesn't grantee happiness. In fact, the name Autumn implies just the opposite, more like 'here we go again' than 'happily ever after.

Summer, too, is not guaranteed a happy life. By the time they meet in the park the bloom is off the rose. We see that she is not the manic pixie dream girl he idealized. We know she isn't a horrible heartbreaking bitch, either. She's a person, not too much more together than Tom is and perfectly likely to make her own mistakes and to keep making them. The movie doesn't fill in all the details but the complexity is at least implied. She passes out of Tom's life so her story is no longer part of the movie.

If anything, the whole point of the movie is that Tom doesn't learn. He's a romantic, and that is diametrically opposed to being a realist. He will always have the fantasy first, and get to know the real girl later. To the extant that any of us are romantic at heart we do the same thing. What is a crush if not a the love for the idea of a person you have built up in your head? What you love is a figment of your imagination, an idea of an attractive personality that you project on someone you don't know. We don't know anything about Autumn at the end of the movie. She's only on screen for a couple minutes. The idea that she is desirable or compatible with Tom is all an assumption. It's not based on her at all.

But that's fine. We don't need a ending where everyone learns what they need to learn and emerges newly equipped with the wisdom and the resolve to make the right choice and live the good life. Things don't work like that. Tom may have learned something from his relationship with Summer- every relationship like that changes you- but it's obvious he's still Tom and still has the same quirks and flaws. Will things be different with Autumn? Will she be different? Who knows? But all we can do is keep trying, flawed as we are.

I realize that I am bringing a lot more to the discussion then what was made explicit in the film, but I give the filmmakers credit for allowing for enough ambiguity and complexity that such reflection is possible.

You can find fault with 90 minutes of a whiny hipster kid obsessing about the quirky dream girl but given how many years a lot of us spend doing just that I thought the way the movie presented it was valid. Why can't art be about neurotic, self indulgent narcissistic introspection? Are natural disasters in a foreign country more important? Sure, but 20-year-old Yossarian would not be consoled by such relativism (married 2010 Yoassarian doesn't have breakups, but still sympathizes with Tom's plight and enjoyed the film)

Gender, schmender.

I wasn't offended by the character of Summer. Sure, she's pretty one-dimensional. But, then again, some people just are.

Saying that the film is misogynistic because Summer hurts Tom is a pretty flimsy argument at best. The film isn't trying to say that women are all heartless and selfish anymore than it's saying that women are all magic pixies and have a mysterious, pheremonal effect on every man they walk past.

I don't identify with Summer when I watch the film just because I have a uterus. And I don't object to one female character in one movie being portrayed as the bad guy. I've known women who have broken hearts. I've known men who have broken hearts. It has nothing to do with what kind of... uh... equipment they're toting. It has everything to do with simply being human and, therefore, flawed.

FWIW, I identify strongly with Tom in this film, even though I'm a woman. It isn't because I think women are all evil and Summer is another example to add to my arsenal. It's because I've done what Tom did -- fallen in love with someone who was totally wrong for me. I was fairly warned, but, like Tom, I was convinced that I had the power to change the other person's mind, to make that person see that we were perfect for each other.

I was wrong.

But, like Tom, I grew to see over time that this person who made me so happy and, more often, so miserable, actually bore little resemblance to the person I made him out to be in my head. Once I realized this, I was able to move on and be happy without him -- something I never imagined was possible when I was in love with this person.

Summer's character might have been one-dimensional, but not nearly as one-dimensional as Faraci's interpretation of the film.

I kind of liked magic pixie. I'd go for a magic pixie before I'd go for a manic one.

or even a 'maniacle' one.

NotesOnBathroom, etc.:

Given that Clooney has always been veyr open about the fact that he has been through one marriage that ended in a very nasty divorce and that he never wants to be married ever again, how is he leading these women up the garden path? They know the score. Is it his responsibility to turn them down when they approach him?

Also, have to agree with CoveredInBees about the baby sister. I HATE mataure-beyond-their-years kids in movies. She bicycled from the suburbs into downtown LA, yeah right!!

I just thought I'd point out that Summer's last name is Finn and Tom's is Hansen.

That is all. I did, however, just realize a possible Tom Sawyer/Huckleberry Finn reference in the movie.

Yossarian >> Well said as well. Although, yes, as you acknowledge, much of these points you're bringing up aren't explicit in the film. I don't need explicitness, but I'm also loath to give a film full credit for inspiring discussion that is not explored by the film itself. That sort of ambiguity is of course more than a cut above most films of the genre, but in Summer it still plays just a bit too cutesy and superficial for me.

I agree with most of it, except for this:

Is Stephenie Meyers misogynistic? No. She’s just dumb.

Um.

Right, Adalmin? She's dumb AND a misogynist. She's a dumbsogynist. Unless. . .you were OBJECTING to the dumb label.. .

First off, Yossarian, I greatly appreciate your well thought out, polite critic of my post! Yay for being civilized on the internet! *fistbump*

"But do you really think that the movie implied a happy ending for both characters?"

Yeah, I kind of do. I actually don't think the ending was that subtle or ambiguous at all. Rather, I think it kind of copped out in that Summer got married and Tom got a new crush. I get that the writers needed some way to completely move Summer out of Tom's sphere forever for the relationship to be completely over for him, but did it have to be the classic she-marries-a-guy-she-REALLY-loves reward ending? Additionally, when asked, she even says that it is different with her husband than it was with Tom. In my mind, this means that it was never that Summer truly wasn't "a relationship person," she just wanted a relationship with the right guy. So the authors gave her that. Like I said, she didn't learn or change, but she got rewarded. In addition to my personal displeasure at that plot development, I think that does a disservice to the movies supposed purpose of not telling a love story. If they had removed Summer because she went of to join a celibate nunnery in the South of France, then I would have been much more okay with her story conclusion and it would have removed my argument that she got rewarded for abusing her power and then learning nothing.

I feel the same way about Tom, and you give, that he doesn't learn anything. As you said:

"If anything, the whole point of the movie is that Tom doesn't learn. He's a romantic, and that is diametrically opposed to being a realist."

Firstly, I must say that while it may be true that realism and romanticism are diametric opposites, I don't think that is an excuse to be one or the other. From how I look at it, realism and romanticism exist on a spectrum, and we should all strive to exist somewhere in a comfortable medium. Just like a complete realist would be seen as a boorish cynic, a hopeless romantic is often a foolish baby. And I will even further give you that if I thought this movie was glamorizing a different set of ideals, I would have no problem with the fact that Tom does not change. There are many excellent movies in which lead or important characters learn nothing or change in no way. (Though the only one I can think of at this moment is WALL-E...but that's still an excellent movie!) But my problem remains that I have issue with THIS movie because it glamorizes no growth or evolution in this important action of self and partner recognition and inspection in relationships. In fact, you even state:

"What you love is a figment of your imagination, an idea of an attractive personality that you project on someone you don't know."

With all due respect, that idea is exactly the kind of bulls#!% that needs to be stop being fed to people. True, that kind of emotional response is what happens when you have a crush, and it is responsible for the beginning of many relationships. But I completely disagree with the idea that it is what we should be ENCOURAGED to look for in relationships. We should encourage relationships that teach us, and change us, and bring us closer to self-actualization! Not relationships where we get rewarded for our same old immaturities and destructive patterns. When you say:

"You can find fault with 90 minutes of a whiny hipster kid obsessing about the quirky dream girl but given how many years a lot of us spend doing just that I thought the way the movie presented it was valid."

I must reply that while it is certainly just a matter of taste as to whether the story of hipster kid and quirky girl make a good movie, I, on every level, disagree with the idea that the movie presented this story in a valid way, much less in a way that should receive such vast praise and defense. This glamorization of this lack of personal introspection, this lack of attempts to learn to empathize, and this lack of a desire to break our own self destructive patterns burns me to my very core. I will even go out on a (HUGE) limb here and say that I think a horrible movie like The Break Up had more to offer than 500 Days. At least horrible actions in The Break Up had consequences that people learned from! Equally horrible actions in this movie had NO consequences, NO body changed, and EVERYONE loves it! For the love of humanity, I would rather people take relationship advice from Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (ed. note, please don't do that) than continue to hold this movie on such a high pedestal of "how I feel that relationships go". Indeed:

"Why can't art be about neurotic, self indulgent narcissistic introspection? Are natural disasters in a foreign country more important? Sure, but 20-year-old Yossarian would not be consoled by such relativism"

Well, art can be about neurotic, self indulgent narcissism. Indeed, some art SHOULD be about this kind of narcissism...hopefully to provide us all with an example of what we DON'T want to limit ourselves to. And I understand that almost any 20 year-old does not find comfort in the idea that there are bigger things out there...heck, Yossarian, 20 year-old NotesOnMyBathroomMirror had a thing for emo music and angst-y guys with long hair...but would YOU want to be emotionally 20 years old again? Would you choose to have nothing but the limited range of thoughts, experiences and emotional growth you had at that time? I wouldn't...in fact the only consolation I see in getting older is that maybe I won't be such an undeveloped f*@&up like I am now. And I pray that others feel the same way. But when so many people praise and defend a work of art that, in my mind, preaches the exact opposite of that idea, I get worried and sad for those around me.

And again, thank you for your well put counter argument, but this is still why I do not like this movie.

I always take what Faraci says with a tremendous grain of salt. Let's not forget he was the guy who found Wall-E to be a rape fantasy. And of course, he's been on a tremendous crusade against Avatar that seems to go beyond just finding it to be a second-rate movie (which it is).

As for his statement of (500) Days being mysogynistic...I don't agree with it. At no point are Tom's actions or thoughts displaying anger against all women or even just Summer. He seems more lost than angry.

NotesOnMyBathroomMirror- I'll try to formulate another response but right now if I don't get this month end report done I'm going to get fired.
*fistbump back*

What I think is interesting, NotesOnMyBathroomMirror, is that you think the creative force behind this film DO condone Tom's behavior. Tom acts a fool (an adorable romantic fool, but a fool) and for this, gets a lot of pain and heartache and, yes, he meets another girl in the end, and is, perhaps, destined to repeat himself because he hasn't learned anything.

Or, alternatively, since we see NOTHING of how he behaves with Autumn (except that, from the start, he is more direct with her than he was with Summer. He lied to Summer about his feelings, pathetically tried to lure her in by playing the Smiths at his desk) he might, MAYBE, have learned something from his relationship and matured. If you see Autumn as a reward for Tom, it would only be a reward if he learned to modify his behavior and expectations and engage in a more mature relationship. If you think he will make all the same mistakes, then she's a "punishment," more than a reward.

But, either way, I don't think the writer/director is holding up Tom's behavior as either ideal or acceptable but, rather, holding up a mirror to our own behavior. "Isn't this ridiculous, audience. This thing we do? Isn't the human condition unbearable sometimes and isn't it amazing how much of it is our own making?"

But repeating mistakes in relationships is how we learn. Sometimes we learn form just one relationship. Sometimes it takes several. I love this movie, but it only skims the surface of what Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind explores so eloquently.

And, in the words of Woody Allen, that inveterate relationship fuck-up, "Well, I guess that's pretty much now how I feel about relationships. You know, they're totally irrational and crazy and absurd and, but uh, I guess we keep going through it...because...most of us need the eggs."

Sorry for the double-post. Getting past the lockdown at work is - um - challenging.

Please don't patronize me for it.

I think the film was sexist, and that is mostly because of the director's comments at the screening I saw. Also, partly because of the opening title cards, where he calls someone named Jenny Beckman a bitch, which got a huge laugh! Haha, he called someone a bitch! She's such a bitch! Hahahahaha. Isn't that just hila...wait, where's the joke?

Someone asked him, why, in a movie that was so fanciful, he used language like 'bitch' 'cunt' and 'whore' against his female characters. His answer was 'that's just the way guys talk'. Right there, my already lukewarm estimation of the movie went down about 50%. In a movie where the lead character dances with a fucking cartoon bluebird, you were just so committed to hard-hitting reality that you had to use sexist slurs against your female characters?

I reject the defense that 'that's just the way that people talk'. That's what people said about the use of 'Dr. Faggot' in 'The Hangover', and guess what? No one I know throws those words around - because they're not blatantly homophobic, and I certainly would call out someone who used those kinds of words as insults, joking or not. Likewise, I know men who would definitely not be friends with other men who call women bitches and whores, and who would not use that language themselves because they're not misogynists. If the director thinks 'that's just the way guys talk', everywhere, no matter what, maybe that's his own misogyny, reflected in the fact that men who don't refer to women in those terms don't want anything to do with guys like him.

I recently saw the movie and, while it was cute(reallysuperfuckingcute), I did not find it misogynistic. The female character was - for me - the stronger, more sympathetic character, even though the story was not told from her point of view.

I continue to be baffled by the outpouring of love for Joseph Gordon Levitt. I mean, he's cute(reallysuperfuckingcute), but that's all. But he's a little manic and I want to sedate him. Zooey is cute also(see above) and has really pretty eyes. So, I was not particularly moved by the experience because I am old and jaded and probably anti-hipster.

I hope the Pajiba Advocate isn't a one-time thing. Excellent work, gentlemen.

Here's a clue - why not include a women in the discussion? Here we have three men arguing about misogyny. Duh?

Twisted, you are absolutely right. I should have said "I wanted to shake Tom and tell him to quit whining so damn much." Both genders can be whiny and its equally irritating no matter if they have testicles or ovaries.

Yikes. My misog-a-meter* is pretty sensitive, and it didn't even flutter at (500)Days of Summer. If the film is guilty of anything, it's continuing the "type of music you listen to reflects on your worth as a person" trope. The way he looked at her in the elevator as if she'd suddenly become 200 times more attractive because she liked the fucking Smiths.

*This is different from my massage-a-meter, which measures the probability of getting a good neck rub

I agree with what dr. pisaster & coveredinbees said in those last comments.

I don't think endorsement of the behavior (or the emotional maturity / mindset) is the point. Films portray all sorts of behavior that isn't necessarily an endorsement of that behavior. I do think, though, that not liking the behavior of the characters and hence finding the main characters unlikable is a valid reason not to enjoy the film. As I said, that's not why it falls short of greatness for me.

Regarding the ending, I certainly felt like it was a happy one, but I saw the appearance of "Autumn" as a cutesy twist of fate rather than any sort of grand message about punishment or reward. I don't think we can really say one way or the other if Tom has taken the lesson of Summer to heart by that point. I suppose it's open to the viewer's interpretation. Maybe it's a "here we go again" vibe, and maybe it's "things will be o.k. for Tom." I felt like it was more of the latter, but it's up to you.

I think I'm going to read the original script now. I've got it on a shelf here.

ooops, getting to comments now and agreed @ Rebecca. ... good points there...damnit

Can't comment on the film (haven't seen it), but on the matter of "misogyny", some folks just scream it the same way teabaggers scream "Hitler". It's the rhetorical equivalent of shouting to be heard, not to be right, a technique often favoured by the "I might not be a smart man like you and yer fancy book learnin' but dammit I got OPINIONS!" crowd

Does sexism need an equivalent of Godwin's Law?

There's a Sunset Rubdown song that I love called Idiot Heart, and in about the middle of it Spencer Krug sings/repeats "And you know your heart, and you know your heart" about 15 times before adding "But it's an Idiot Heart." I love it because it rings so true to me. How many times have I fallen into the same pattern of liking the unavailable person, and been completely aware of it?

Many times! And of course I'll do it again. That's what the pursuit of love is, I think... knowing how ridiculous it is and still being ready to throw everything you have at it. That's why the ending, with no real lessons being learned didn't bother me at all.

Loved this column, too. Well done!

Yes, Stephenie Meyer is dumb, but how the hell is she not a misogynist?

I just want to say that either Dustin or TK read TV Tropes, because they couldn't mention Manic Pixie Dream Girl without reading that article (alternatively they could have read the original AV Club article, but that was quite a while ago so I'm guessing it was TV Tropes)

@ Dustin

You started it.

And Rebecca illustrates exactly the kind of thinking I was talking about. A character says something bad about women--->the director hates women. I haven't seen this particular movie, but in most movies with any degree of sophistication, that is intended to reflect on the character saying it, not the character being criticized. In the really sophisticated movies it often doesn't even mean the character saying it is a "bad person," but rather that they are confused and lashing out or trying to be cool.

It's the most patronizing thing in the world to be denied the right to be imperfect.

I love this so much I want to get a tattoo of it.

We don't need a ending where everyone learns what they need to learn and emerges newly equipped with the wisdom and the resolve to make the right choice and live the good life. Things don't work like that.

Also this. I'm not really sure where I'm going to put that one, 'cause it's kind of long.

I wish I could be more involved in this discussion, which is THOROUGHLY amazing, including counterpoints. I have not seen the film yet, alas, so I don't feel right commenting on what it says about any of the issues raised. But I did want to tell y'all that I love you to pieces. There are really some excellent points made here.

I did want to ask, though: What ever *did* happen to the Pajiba Movie Club?

As usual, I'm late to the party and most of what I would have said has already been laid out much more eloquently by all y'all above.

Maybe I'm just an optimist at heart, but I do think that Tom is going to do better in the next go-round with Autumn. It reminds me of an old song about learning from the mistakes you have made, in that those experiences make you the person you are in the present moment:

Somehow I find myself far out of line from the ones I had drawn
Wasn't the best of paths, you could attest to that, but I'm keeping on.
Would our paths cross if every great loss had turned out our gain?
Would our paths cross if the pain it had cost us was paid in vain?
There was no pot of gold, hardly a rainbow lighting my way
But I will be true to the red, black and blues that colored those days.
I owe my soul to each fork in the road, each misleading sign.
'Cause even in solitude, no bitter attitude can dissolve my sweetest find
Thanksgiving for every wrong move that made it right.

(the song is called Thanksgiving by Poi Dog Pondering)

I just wanted to add that I've been a lurker off and on here for years, and this article and the amazing comments are some of the best I've read here. Thanks to Dustin and all you Eloquents (the name is well deserved). More like this please.

p.s. Thank god Bianca hasn't shown up to weigh in on misogyny. I couldn't go through that again...

Oh, Yoss. Robert Downey, Jr., is going to need a big stick to fight you off for the #1 spot on my Pajiba-Related Dreamboats list.

And I'd also like to say to those who disliked the idea of Summer having a "happy ending," despite the fact that she broke Tom's heart: sometimes, people get good things out of life, even if they don't deserve it.

The person who broke my heart got married to someone else shortly after said heart-breaking. They're very happy. And I'm happy for them (now. I have to admit, it was pretty hard in the beginning).

Sure, I sometimes think it's unfair that he and his wife never fight while I'm stuck at home trying to tolerate my parents. But not everyone who ever hurt someone else will get chest-kicked into a bottomless pit of suffering. THIS! ISN'T! SPARTA!!!! This is real life, and some people might get really, really lucky, while others don't.

I feel like some people didn't like Summer's "happy ending" because she would never learn that she had behaved badly. She'd never be sorry for how she treated Tom. She'd just continue being the same self-centered person she'd always been. I think that's valid. But I think that's sad for her. She'll always be the same selfish person. At least Tom got the opportunity to learn and, hopefully, to change. That's more valuable than getting what you wanted, sometimes.

I've said it once, and I'll say it again. I thought "(500)" was the best movie of the year, if for nothing more than the Reality v. Expectations split-screen sequence set to Regina Spektor's "Hero." It was one of the finest moments of moviemaking in recent history. And it's a movie that I've seen 4 times and sobbed with and laughed with 4 times.

I have little to no experience with women, but I was able to take the story and relate it to break-ups with my own with boyfriends of the past. The movie didn't need to flesh out Summer, because he wasn't in love with Summer. He was in love with his idea of her, which was the point of the whole damn movie. It made me, the viewer, fall in love with her quirkiness as well, and then fall out of love, hard...and fast.

I am dismayed by its lack of inclusion in the Oscars, but then, these are the folks that awarded "Crash" over "Brokeback" I don't give them much in the way of credit.

Isn’t everyone a bit too harsh on Summer? Well, I wouldn’t have considered where she’s coming from either if I wasn’t Summer myself at one point. And I know, I know, this movie details Tom as an extension of ourselves. I identify more with Tom, too. It ruins everything to mull over how Summer might have felt during the relationship.

But few have touched on this – the way it feels not just to be put on a pedestal but also to be loved for characteristics that aren’t even yours. I dated someone who gave me books that he “knew I had to have” on topics that didn’t appeal to me at all – they interested him. He’d also chuckle at aspects of my personality that I didn’t think were “me” at all.

It was suffocating and the worst was that I really did like him. We had our moments, and it sucked that someone could come so close and yet be so far removed from someone who made me happy in a way that would last. I never wanted to hurt him, but does anyone? Remember how Tom misreads the ending of The Graduate as happy while Summer sees the precarious choice Elaine has made in Ben and cries?

I’m not saying Summer should be excused or that she was a victim. I recognize many of my selfish actions in her. But I also recognize my own Tomfoolery in the way I’ve liked other guys, and it stings to think I might have made them feel like Summers in their own right.

It’s easy to begrudge someone for the misery they left us in by not loving us. It’s hard to consider that maybe we made someone unhappy by the way we loved them. Summers have a right to their own happiness, even though it hurts when that happiness can’t come from being with you.

But what do I know. I’m just a crazy bag lady.

My favorite comment I saw about this movie came from a friend: "500 Days of Summer? More like 500 Days of Zooey Deschanel Being A Huge Bitch!"

Rebecca - excellent distinction between sexist and misogynist. I don't think this movie's misogynist. I do, however, think it reveals quite a few wimmin issues.

I was a Summer - so what? How old are these people supposed to be - about 25? I cringe at how blithely cruel I was to some guys. I never really had the reverse happen to me because I was always on the defensive in relationships, for better or worse.

I don't know if a girl named Autumn can really be considered a guaranteed happy ending...she's not named after the last season of the year - in fact her name is a transitional season of sorts.

I think she is just the next step in Tom's romantic life. And her name fits into the method used to tell the story and slightly twee nature of the whole thing.

Would there ever be a girl named Winter? That's what I want to know.

Okay, so I came into this discussion entirely too late to have any real significance since all the major points have been knocked off, mostly by Yossarian. (When are you gonna start writing for this sight?) But here goes.

People are nagging about both characters inability to change which, I am completely unable to understand considering the director beats you over the head with the fact that they do. Summer, the ever elusive not that into relationships pixie. Settles down and makes a commitment. Whether for better or worse, who cares? Its life sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. The point is even if her perspective on how to end a relationship well hasn't changed she has progressed as a character. Whether thats good or bad depends on who is looking.

Tom on the other hand Of course takes much much longer to adjust, and possibly more subtly. So he makes relationship mistakes all through the movie..Who hasn't? At the end of the film he's focusing on self improvement instead of pining over someone that didn't have his best interests at heart. Good. He should have been doing that in the first place. And are we really going to complain that he met a woman at the end of the movie? Would you prefer he stay a whiny hipster well into his 40's? The kid grows up and learns to look not at WOMEN but at RELATIONSHIPS with a bit of skepticsm. I mean the narrator actually says "Tom was pretty sure everything he knew was wrong blah blah," before the kid went back and asked her. I mean we watched the kid get pounded on emotionally for 90 minutes throw him a bone.

The point is, the movie wasn't about who we should be. It's about who most of us are...or were...or at the very least someone we know. My best friend has lived this movie 5 times over and won't learn his lesson. Thats the point. Relationships aren't about intelligence or doing the right thing. We can all try to move in that direction. But at the end of the day it's a bunch of chemicals making us act a lot less rational than we normally are. And for that reason, I loved it.

OH and for the poster complaining bout the use of Bitch and Whore in the movie, use a little context please. He wasn't calling his mother a bitch he wasn't calling Princess Di a bitch. He was calling the woman that broke his heart a bitch. Which is the second stage of Denial and yes we all do it. We even feel bad about it afterwards sometimes. But if you can claim you never called any of your exes Dicks or assholes, than your a liar....or you don't ever use bad language in which case....why the fuck are you here?

good blog post, i clearly enjoy this page, keep it.