There are a lot of bits and pieces of (500) Days of Summer that I can relate to from parts of my younger adult life. I didn't get around to seeing it until a Blu-ray arrived for review, and feel bad that I didn't see it on the big screen. I'm appending my Best New Release Blu-ray Transfers of 2009 post as we speak. Joseph Gordon-Levitt has always jockeyed hard for roles that will actually live on in the collective consciousness as much as possible.
His turn in The Lookout is among a select group of truly outstanding performances of the last decade that very few ended up seeing. He never mugs or goes too broad. Few actors of his generation have that capacity for control and sensitivity, and that's why I love watching him work. The pools of optimism in his eyes are refreshing to one in a society of hardened cynics and jerks who want nothing more than to shit on something new and unfamiliar.
The most amusing responses I've seen to this movie have been from man-children who take Tom's (Levitt) journey in the film as validation of their refusal to grow up. They don't see his relationship with Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel) as a case where he grew and evolved as an emotional being, but rather, as a testament to the notion that everything that goes wrong in one's life is obviously the fault of "that evil bitch who lead me on". It's all deflection and finger-pointing with these guys, the same ones who hang out only with one another and no one else. These are the gangs of mouth-breathing giggleheads who parade around in little packs at film festivals to feel more popular in their isolation, laughing at every not-clever thing any of them say. These are the guys who are not (and may never be) past where Tom is in emotional growth.
The transfer on the Blu-ray is crisp and consistent throughout, and the audio gladly reminds that the days of hiss and sound artifacts on new releases are thankfully behind us. The extras leave little to be desired either. My favorite among them, and the simplest, is the Bank Dance short from director Marc Webb. He's good at working with these two actors, and I wonder if we'd see another collaboration down the line with different characters in a different story. The deleted and extended scenes include a couple of bits seen in the trailer but not the movie. The Making-of featurette is a bit more nutritious than is expected for pieces of its type. The web-posted Conversations with Zooey and Joseph are fun and entertaining as a "watch once" thing. The Summer @ Sundance piece is a nice glance at the world of the Sundance Film Festival for those who've never been (myself included). The included Digital Copy is one of the few I actually dump into my iTunes library and carry around from time to time.