Palm Springs Review
The infinite time loop premise has become a niche sub genre of storytelling that has turned out some really fascinating stuff. Think Edge of Tomorrow/Live Die Repeat, Russian Doll, The Girl Who Leapt through Time, the Happy Death Day series, and of course, Groundhog Day (which is THE movie that writer Andy Siara tried very hard to distant Palm Springs from). All these works feel original and tackled time loops through perspectives and themes and Palm Springs rises up to the challenge of setting a few contrasting characters together with their own different philosophies. Take Andy Samberg's Nyles. He's the one who's trapped in a single day the longest who's settled into the defeatist's mindset. You think it, he's done it. He's submitted to the cosmic forces that be. There's no hope and so why try to fight back? Cristin Milioti's Sarah on the other hand is the audience surrogate. She's not okay with this for the most part and actively fights against living out her worst day over and over again. There's also another entity in this that serves as a great foil and antagonist to both of them and really brings out the existential crisis that they all experience while adding an extra layer to where the movie is heading towards its final act.
Milioti and Samberg are great together. Both are fun to watch on screen and things are even better when they're together. Milioti in particular is the true mvp as she goes through every emotional beat one would go through if they were stuck in a loop and she's convincing every moment of it. Though I would've liked for the movie to spend a bit more time on her pov rather than Samberg's since she's more interesting as a character to me while Samberg serves more as a a glorified exposition machine (who's hiding some important secrets. And I'm not sure if I really bought their relationship together during the movie's short 90 minute runtime. But the movie does bring that up in a meta way and that becomes character arcs for both of them.
Palm Springs is a great time that's light, funny, and philosophical. It's performances are great and so is its message. It's worth your time.