Palm Springs Movie Review

Palm Springs (2020)

Rent Palm Springs on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: Andy Siara (screenplay by), Max Barbakow (story by), Andy Siara (story by)
Directed by: Max Barbakow
Starring: Andy Samberg, Cristin Milioti, J.K. Simmons, Peter Gallagher, Tyler Hoechlin, Meredith Hagner
Rated: R
Watch the trailer

Plot
Stuck in a time loop, two wedding guests develop a budding romance while living the same day over and over again.

Verdict
It's urprisingly good. I'll watch any time travel movie, and time loops have been done many times, but this manages to be thoughtful and playful. I don't recall a time loop comedy, but this excels with the genre while asking probing questions and a conclusion I've never seen in this trope. It's a smart script that doesn't waste any scenes. Everything builds and develops while managing to be both comedic and introspective.
Watch It.

Review
The most prominent example of time loop sub-genre is Groundhog Day. There's the space war version Edge of Tomorrow, the lackluster horror version Happy Death Day, the endearing The Map of Tiny, Perfect Things and even The X-Files and Star Trek: The Next Generation did episodes with the trope.

From the start this doesn't try to hide the trope, and I really like the take. We know the premise. We can tell Nyles (Andy Samberg) is repeating this day. This has fun with the trope with Nyles resigned to this fate and just wanting to enjoy himself. He's trying to impress Sarah (Cristin Milioti) who inadvertently gets trapped in the loop and Nyles acts as her chaperone.

This generates a lot of question as to how and why, and the movie answers them well enough.

Andy Samberg plays Nyles.

Nyles is the jaded veteran of the loop while Sarah is the scared novice. It's a nice juxtaposition. It's a great setup that provides a lot of fun. Nyles knows what Sarah is going through, but she has to try all the typical ways to 'get out.' The sequence reveals a glimpse at how long Nyles has been doing this while developing Sarah's character.

The movie never answers how long Nyles has been in the loop. It's been long enough that he can barely remember his past life and it's clear he's been doing this for an incredibly long time.

This does get a bit predictable when Sarah and Nyles get in a fight and are no longer in contact. The reason for that is Sarah waking up every day with a mistake staring back at her. The movie teases what this could be to add a bit of drama before the reveal. When you repeat the same day, you can't move past mistakes. This prevents Sarah from fully embracing the repetition.

Cristin Milioti and Andy Samberg play Sarah and Nyles.

Nyles had made peace with his life. Meeting and then losing Sarah upended everything. This causes Nyles to make peace with an aspect of this loop he had avoided and Sarah had encouraged him to resolve. The movie manages to make this comical before resolving it thoughtfully.

I wanted more from the ending. It's just a bit too easy with a movie that had avoided many of the overused aspects of the genre. The movie does have one last scene that makes the ending slightly better.