If the coronavirus had never come along and “Palm Springs” was being released into a few hundred (or a couple thousand) theaters this week, the pressure would have been intense on the Max Barbakow comedy. After all, back in January the movie landed the largest deal in the history of the Sundance Film Festival at more than $17.5 million, which put it at risk of joining other recent eight-figure Sundance deals that didn’t result in box-office gold: “Late Night,” “Brittany Runs a Marathon,” “Blinded by the Light,” “The Birth of a Nation” and, really, the majority of the big-money Sundance deals since “Little Miss Sunshine” in 2006.
But with theaters closed, “Palm Springs” will be debuting in scattered drive-in theaters but mostly on Hulu, where the expectations won’t be so high and the return on Hulu and Neon’s investment can’t be so easily quantified. And maybe that will allow people to enjoy the film not for what it says about Sundance deal-making, but for the film itself — a thoroughly enjoyable indie spin on the time-loop premise that has been central to everything from the classic comedy “Groundhog Day” to the sci-fi action flicks “Edge of Tomorrow” and “Source Code” to the TV series “Russian Doll.”
Of course, “Groundhog Day” is the obvious point of comparison, with “Palm Springs” being an indie rom-com riff on the conceit that found Bill Murray’s weatherman reliving the same day over and over again. In this case, the guy stuck in a day that endlessly repeats is played by Andy Samberg, and he’s been stuck in that single day for so long that he can’t even remember the job he held before he headed to the desert resort town of Palm Springs for the wedding of a friend of his girlfriend.
We meet Samberg’s character, Nyles, when he wakes up on the morning of the wedding and halfheartedly ogles the leg of his girlfriend, Misty (Meredith Hagner). In fact, he’s pretty halfhearted about everything all day long, wearing shorts and a Hawaiian shirt to the wedding and exerting himself only to step in and deliver a touching speech that bails out the unprepared and inebriated maid of honor and black-sheep sister of the bride, Sarah (Cristin Milioti).
She’s touched by the gesture, and before long the two of them are out in the desert in the middle of the night preparing to have torrid sex. But some powerful coitus interruptus arrives when a mysterious, angry archer shoots an arrow into Nyles’ back — and when Sarah follows him into a nearby cave to escape the bowman who’s hunting him, she ends up sucked into the same loop in which Nyles has been living for who knows how long.
From this point on, no matter what Sarah does or where she goes, she’ll wake up every morning in the Palm Springs hotel room on the day of the wedding. She freaks out at the idea, but Nyles is blasé as he explains that she’s stuck and that even killing herself will simply give her an earlier reset to the morning: “It’s one of those infinite time-loop situations you may have heard of,” he says.
If Nyles is blasé about it, that’s because he’s blasé about pretty much everything. “Today, tomorrow, yesterday,” he shrugs. “It’s all the same.”
It isn’t really all the same, though, even if it always starts the same way. “Palm Springs” finds plenty of variations on the wedding day — some descend into slapstick, some are rooted in Sarah’s anger and for a stretch in the middle of the movie, it’s all about these two sad-sack cynics embracing the silliness of a predicament where they can do pretty much anything without consequence. (It helps that death is the kind of thing that can be played for laughs under this premise, which you could sum up as “Infinite Weddings and No Funeral.”)
The setup is durable, as “Russian Doll” has most recently proven, but Barbakow, Samberg, Milioti and writer Andy Siara find a freshness in the way they play with it and the way they mess with the romantic comedy tropes that are all but inevitable when you stick a couple together like this movie does. So yeah, Nyles needs to mature and Sarah needs to stop being self-destructive, but neither of those things actually helps them much in a playful film that mocks the usual time-loop ideas that you can get out of it by living a perfect, selfless day or finding true happiness or killing the bad guy.
This is a version of “Groundhog Day” that throws in fights, explosions, synchronized dance routines in a pool hall and incidental lessons in grammar (funny) and quantum physics (incomprehensible). Plus J.K. Simmons, priceless as always as that guy shooting arrows at Nyles when he’s not barbecuing salmon for his wife and kids in Irvine.
“Palm Springs” might make your head hurt if you think too much about it — or, I don’t know, maybe it’ll all make perfect sense. But what’s the point of thinking too much about a consistently pleasing and occasionally touching comedy featuring people who are fun to watch?
And hey, we’re all still (mostly) on lockdown anyway, right? It might just be the perfect time for an inventive comedy about isolation and repetition.
'Groundhog Day' and 14 Other Movies That Repeat the Same Day Over and Over (Photos)
You know a movie is special when people describe it as "Groundhog Day" crossed with... something you'd never expect. Here are a handful of films that were inspired by or informed a similar time loop story as the Bill Murray rom-com classic
Columbia Pictures Corporation
“12:01” (1993) • The short story on which “12:01” is based actually pre-dates “Groundhog Day” by nearly 20 years. It’s about a man caught reliving the worst day of his life when his wife is shot and killed. After receiving an electrical shock at midnight, he relives the previous day and finds that things get worse.
New Line Television
“Run Lola Run” (1998) • Tom Tykwer’s action classic takes the time looping premise and turns it into a kinetic, real-time thrill ride. The title character Lola goes on a 20-minute dash as repeated several times, with each time depicting slight changes in the story that invoke ideas about parallel realities and moral choice.
Sony Pictures Classics
“50 First Dates” (2004) • Leave it to Adam Sandler to make another rom-com aping a “Groundhog Day” premise. In this one, Drew Barrymore only thinks she’s living the same day over and over because she has an affliction in which she can’t remember the previous day, but it doesn't stop Sandler from trying to win her over. Short-term memory loss is a real thing, but not Barrymore’s specific affliction.
Columbia Pictures Corporation
“Primer” (2004) • One of the more creative indie time travel stories you’re likely to see, Shane Carruth’s lo-fi thriller is a densely plotted science fiction story about two entrepreneurial inventors who accidentally invent a device that allows them to travel back in time for a few hours at a time. Carruth keeps us in the dark as to what they’ve actually invented until well into the film, and it maintains its tension as it evolves into a character study of these two men trying to double cross the other.
THINKFilm
“Source Code” (2011) • Jake Gyllenhaal wakes up in someone else’s body eight minutes before a terrorist attack blows up the train he’s riding on. It’s his job to use that time to find the terrorist and stop the attack. The movie’s first eight minutes are its best when he realizes that he’s living someone else’s final moments. Director Duncan Jones uses the sci-fi set up as a parable for the frustration of being used as a tool and the nature of free will within each alternate reality.
Summit Entertainment
“Edge of Tomorrow” a.k.a. “Live. Die. Repeat.” (2014) • This is one of Tom Cruise’s most underrated roles. We watch him die on an endless loop as he tries to learn how to win in a war against aliens, with each of his lives playing out like a video game in which he gains experience and gets closer to winning. But its charm comes from a sardonic sense of humor and Cruise’s relationship with a hard-nosed soldier played by Emily Blunt. In the end, she ends up killing him in training more times than the aliens do.
Warner Bros. Pictures
“Naked” (2017) • It’s “Groundhog Day” with no clothes! Phil Connors at least didn’t have to relive the same humiliation Marlon Wayans does, where he wakes up naked hours before his wedding day and has to repeat things over and over until he gets things right. The film is actually a remake of a Swedish film from 2000.
Netflix
“Before I Fall” (2017) • What if “Groundhog Day” was about a mean girl? Zoey Deutch stars as a San Francisco teen with a “perfect” high school life until she’s killed in a car accident. When she repeats the same day of her death, she starts to reassess her relationships and unravel the mystery around her accident.
Open Road Films/Universal Pictures
"Happy Death Day" (2017) and "Happy Death Day 2U" (2019) • "Happy Death Day" is a horror movie about a woman played by Jessica Rothe who has to relive a murder at the hands of a killer in a baby face mask until she can outsmart him and survive. And following the success of that film, the sequel, "Happy Death Day 2U," winks at that premise by having Rothe's character dying all over again...again. And this time, both her and her friends are caught in this vicious death loop.
Universal Pictures
"See You Yesterday" (2019) • Stefon Bristol's time-travel Netflix drama, produced by Spike Lee, features two high-school science geniuses (Eden Duncan-Smith and Dante Crichlow) who keep traveling back to the same day when their first trip back in time ends in tragedy. It combines critiques of racial profiling and over-policing with light moments, including a cameo from "Back to the Future" star Michael J. Fox.
Netflix
"The Obituary of Tunde Johnson" (2019) • This drama played at TIFF and tells the story of a black, gay teenager who is killed in an unprovoked incident of police brutality, only to wake up on the same morning and relive the day of his death.
Toronto Film Review
"Palm Springs" (2020) • This film starring Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti sold for a then-record $17.5 million to Neon and Hulu when it premiered at Sundance. The sci-fi comedy stars Milioti as a woman dreading attending a wedding, only to be drawn to Samberg and get caught up in his own infinite time loop. "Palm Springs" explores personal trauma, depression and guilt for as many wacky set pieces and dance numbers it also has.
Sundance Institute
"The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" (2021) • "The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" directly name-drops "Groundhog Day" and "Edge of Tomorrow" but is a coming of age rom-com about two 17-year-olds who are the only ones aware they're caught in the time loop. Kyle Allen and Kathryn Newton star in the film.
Amazon Studios
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Let’s do the time loop again
You know a movie is special when people describe it as "Groundhog Day" crossed with... something you'd never expect. Here are a handful of films that were inspired by or informed a similar time loop story as the Bill Murray rom-com classic