(500) Days of Summer
Fox Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: July 17, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
76
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
33
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Film ThreatScott Knopf
You're going to hear a lot about 500 Days of Summer over the next few months. All of the good stuff is true. Any bad stuff you hear is not. Read full review
100
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
It's a feat of star acting, and it helps make (500) Days not just bitter or sweet but everything in between. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Here is a rare movie that begins by telling us how it will end and is about how the hero has no idea why. Read full review
100
PremiereStaff (Not credited)
Much like the actual summer (the season, not the character), we never wanted it to end. Read full review
100
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Visually witty, flawlessly played romantic comedy. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesMichael Ordona
Something seldom seen: an original romantic comedy. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The casting is perfect. Webb has chosen leads who are familiar but not overexposed, and who are on equal footing (neither overshadows the other). Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter Travers
A different kind of love story: an honest one that takes a piece out of you. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Much like Annie Hall did for a previous generation, (500) Days of Summer may be the movie that best captures a contemporary romantic sensibility. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
This is a romantic comedy that makes the concept of romantic comedies appealing again -- that reminds you how resonant and transporting they can be when they're done right. Read full review
88
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike Scott
You know how people say that they don't make romantic comedies like they used to? Turns out they do. At least, director Marc Webb does -- and has -- with his clever and sweet debut, 500 Days of Summer. Read full review
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
A movie that will be discovered, embraced and shared with friends like a favorite record album. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
The film does a lovely job of balancing emotional clarity, formal trickery, pop sweetness, and heartfelt narrative. It is, yes, cute, and it is, yes, quirky. And it is entirely justified, estimable and loveable in being those things. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
The writing is often clever and the overall production playful and intelligent. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
The film is, finally, a brilliant tap dance over a void: There’s no real drama when the inner life of the female lead is so shrouded, even if that’s the point. Read full review
80
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel charm the pants off us -- and each other! -- in this irresistible comedy. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
A romantic comedy that feels like real life. Read full review
80
EmpireStaff (Not credited)
Perfectly played, simultaneously serious and light, endlessly inventive, this is a strong contender for the most original date movie of the year. (Terrific) stuff. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones
A funny, seductive, and surprisingly honest dramatization of the ways we snooker ourselves into incompatible love. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
Deschanel does what she does seemingly without effort, managing to convey Summer's mixed-up messed-upness. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
The film has an easygoing, inquisitive spirit, heightened by Webb's visual conceits Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
It's an "Annie Hall" for the iPod generation: über-designed, pleasing to the touch, making up in generic sweetness what it lacks in bite. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid Wiegand
An irresistible feel-good movie about love gone bad. Read full review
75
New York PostLou Lumenick
It's the oldest bittersweet story in the book, of course, but music-video director Marc Webb approaches his feature debut with great confidence, flair and a minimum of schmaltz. Read full review
75
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The whole movie aspires to set an Annie Hall vibe, especially when Tom keeps trying to re-create, first with her and then with someone else. Read full review
70
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Boy gets girl and boy loses girl in convoluted, sometimes cloying but ultimately winning fashion in 500 Days of Summer. Read full review
70
Village VoiceRobert Wilonsky
It's more like a love story in a blender. What is unexpected is the sincerity beneath the modest conceit that, yup, love hurts. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
Slight, charming and refreshingly candid little picture. Read full review
70
SlateDana Stevens
It's fun both to watch and to talk about afterward, and it possesses the elusive rom-com sine qua non: two equally appealing leads who bounce wonderfully off each other. Read full review
70
Washington PostDesson Thomson
And what makes this autopsy of a love affair funny is Tom's ironic, morose commentary as he revisits what happened. Read full review
70
TimeRichard Corliss
Because the emotional drama is so one-sided, I just can't love you. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
It goes down smoothly, thanks in large part to Joseph Gordon-Levitt's grounded lead performance and Marc Webb's slick direction, but it seems like every other scene coughs up a dispiriting cliché. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
Because we know almost from the get-go that things will turn out bad-to-bittersweet for them, the movie is like one long autopsy of what went wrong, starting with Day No. 488. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
Ultimately, the best thing about (500) Days of Summer isn't its gimmicky script. It's the constant performance of Gordon-Levitt, who shifts, scene-by-scene, from moments of ebullience to abject dejection. Read full review
40
NPRNathan Lee
For all its rhetorical whimsy and hipster dressings, (500) Days of Summer is a thoroughly conservative affair, as culturally and romantically status quo as any Jennifer Aniston vehicle. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
An exhaustive and exhausting dissection of a relationship that was never all that promising in the first place. Read full review
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