500 Days of Summer (2009)

MIMDB score: 7.5
Current IMDB score: 7.8
Director: Marc Webb
Main Actors you care about: Zooey Deschanel, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Chloe Grace Moretz

Why I liked it: It made me pissed.  It's one of the few movies I hate but still think is good.

I am upset with this quote:  "Just because she likes the same bizzaro crap you do doesn't mean she's your soul mate."  I wrote a whole paragraph about it but I ended up deleting because technically the quote is correct.  That doesn't mean she's your soul mate.  I don't like it because the quote misleads your mind.  Liking the same bizzaro crap can lead to her being your soul mate.  It's not a negative to like the same bizzaro crap!  It's a positive!  In fact I would go to say that you should be looking for people that like the same bizzaro crap that you do because I personally believe that's what leads to long term happiness.  And if one those people that does like the same bizzaro crap happens to be someone you fall in love with then shit, it's awesome.  Every time I read or hear the quote I get upset because it barely makes sense.

What stands out:  The story hits home with a lot of people.  It upsets a lot of people.  It looks at what happens more often than not in a relationship.  Most relationships do not work out.  Only "one" kind of does work out.  By one relationship I mean the current relationship you are in (if you are in one).  If the one you are currently in fails then I'm talking about the next relationship then.  For most people, all the people that it didn't work out with is a higher number than the current number of people it's working out with right now.

It's not fun when one person wants the relationship and the other doesn't.  This is especially true when the one side can't for of the life of them can't figure out why the other doesn't want to keep going.  Media and society I feel like pushes you toward believing that one love at a time is how it should work.  The problem with this way of dating/being in relationships doesn't work as well as just dating as many people as you can and pick the person that you most like that also wants to date you back.  This works well if your main goal is to be with someone (even it's not one of your top choice(s)).  Most people can handle the one or two people that don't want to date you.  It's just an awful when consistently the people you want to date don't want to date you.  You kind of give up after awhile.  This movie makes you feel that feeling at least once which is why I hate this movie but also will say it's good.  It's good to feel like feeling if you haven't felt it in your life (which is like 1% of people).

Thing(s) I would change:  Zooey is well casted as this is the type of girl I believe she is in real life.  She might even be too well casted to the point where I hate Zooey in everything else she's been in now.  All I see is Summer hurting Tom.

The worst thing is Summer hurt Tom and Summer just benefited from it.  Summer figured out that love existed and got to feel it because she knew with Tom what love was not like.  Tom as the hopeless romantic didn't seem to learn anything.  It's just a big kick in the pants to hopeless romantics which are the people that this movie is targeting.

Favorite Line(s)/Scene:
Expectation vs Reality scene (of course).  This scene sums up most people's thought process before going to an event.  It's fantastically done.

Similar Movies/TV Shows:  Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, Comet

"Side" note: Since this movie is not really about the happiness of relationships or love the color red is not used very often.  Instead the color blue is used to represent love. That is a pretty wonderful touch.

Comet (2014)

MIMDB score: 7.8
Current IMDB score: 6.7
Director: Sam Esmail
Main Actors you care about: Justin Long, Emmy Rossum

Why I liked it: It made me want to watch it again.  A movie hasn't done that to me in awhile.  It's just straight insane dialogue and it's hard to keep up.  It's really woven well I think.  Things are brought up that relate to other things but only after thinking about it.  I'm sure the lighting choices matter as well but I haven't figured it all out yet.  I don't know why IMDB has it so low at 6.7.  This is an interesting movie to think through at least once I feel like.  Maybe it's really niche because of how weird it kind of is.  It has two really big stars I feel like so people should have gotten over that like in Eternal Sunshine but oh well. I guess the theme Eternal Sunshine has was more appealing than this movie.  I'm guessing it just hasn't been seen by enough people.  It only has about 9k votes at the time of writing this.

I like to think that you can interpret the movie as all the same relationship or different relationships.

What stands out:  The speed.  It reminds me of like an action movie that starts going and never stops.  Just one thing after another but in a romantic way so you know, worth understanding what is happening as opposed to actions movies where crap happens and you get an adrenaline rush for a bit without much thought.  I had an adrenaline rush that was coupled with a lot of thought which I consider rare in a movie.

Thing(s) I would change:  At first I was going to say the ending but after more thought I think it's good.  I was kind of feeling they should not be together because that's more a final resolution but I think they do get back together after I realized the pregnancy was originally suppose to be her lie at the start of their relationship.  It makes very clever sense (which the movie goes along with the feel I got from the movie) that she was lying about being pregnant at the end as well.

Favorite Line(s)/Scene:
The whole movie really. The way they wove the story line was how I want movies to be at lot of the time.

I do want to call out the scene where the girl just starts yelling at him when they are in the hotel before the wedding (and his proposal) and he just drowns her out and listens to music.  I do that pretty often and I loved seeing it happen to some one else.

Similar Movies/TV Shows: Cellular (action movie), Gilmore Girls because they are talking so freaking fast. The all movies I like: Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, Vanilla Sky, The Fountain, Mr. Nobody, Once, 500 Days of Summer, Cloud Atlas.

"Side" note: Genesis and Catastrophe: A True Story It's kind of interesting story to think about especially how it might relate to the relationship in the story.