Groundhog Day is now a genre. It’s happened too many times and in too many ways for it to be anything else. We’ve seen it Punxsutawney and Palm Springs. We’ve seen it through life and death. We’ve seen it in horror, comedy, drama, sci-fi, and action. Groundhog Day is still the best the Groundhog Day genre has to offer, but –unlike some other genres—the knockoffs aren’t bad. Do you know why the Groundhog Day knockoffs aren’t bad? Because they can guarantee character development… which is one of the main reasons we watch film. At that’s a particular something even Oscar winners can’t guarantee.
The reason Groundhog Day films guarantee character development is simple: the hero is stuck in a time loop and has to change to get out of it. If the hero doesn’t change, the film never ends. And there you have it. The “re-living the same day” format has thus replaced boxing as the simplest movie metaphor for the human condition. In a way, we are all stuck in time loops. Almost every single human on the planet is subject to patterns and routines and constraints. Often, our growth as humans only occurs when we choose to break the patterns of our lives, which can be dangerous or scary or downright stupid which is why we generally do not. This genre shows us the way … sorta.
Mark (Kyle Allen) seems to be the first happy-go-lucky member of the stuck-in-a-time-loop crowd. Why wouldn’t he be? It’s summer. It’s nice out in his town of Wherever, USA. He has summer school to skip and a girl to save at the pool. Maybe this time she’ll go out with him … nah. The key is Mark doesn’t seem to want much out of life, so he’s not terribly bothered by the fact that it’s all the same, all the time.
And he lives an entire day of being a small-time hero, again and again. He gives directions to the same somebody who doesn’t ask … he saves the same fender bender from occurring … he stops the same man from walking into bird poop. It’s the little things. Mark also takes immense pleasure in perfect moments. I don’t know how long I could enjoy saving the same coffee cup at exactly 7:25 am every day, but Mark does.
Isn’t there a girl involved? Of course there’s a girl involved. This is a teen film. Margaret (Kathryn Newton) enters the picture by spoiling Mark’s pool save moment. Huh? That’s new. Margaret, too, is stuck in the same time loop, but didn’t realize she wasn’t alone. I think the best part here is Margaret isn’t terribly curious about Mark’s experiences, nor does she initially want to spend any time with him. That’s weird, right? It’s like going to a country where 
nobody speaks English, walking around for two months never hearing a word of English, randomly discovering an English speaker, and not wanting to have anything to do with them. That’s weird.
Margaret has her own agenda, of course. And she, too, acknowledges the sharable moments throughout their town. Together, she and Mark can create The Map of Tiny Perfect Things. And maybe Mark can fall in love. Or not. I swear one of my favorite parts of this film is that the romance is a bit of an afterthought. We don’t have to have two teens falling in love for this story to work. We tend to think that the “endless day” scenario will end in romance, and I’m not sure why … nor am I sure the universe is necessarily geared towards: “ok, they finally fell in love, we can start again.” That doesn’t resonate in any single part of history I have learned to this point.
The Map of Tiny Perfect Things must seem like yet another in an increasingly popular and perhaps tiring genre. I say we need more. The Groundhog Day genre is like an escape room. These films fit in exactly with our ethos of collective problem solving. And I don’t wish to generalize too much here because Tiny Perfect Things was a fun ride by itself. I’m sorry that the film veered towards the romance angle because it was working without such; quite frankly, I found it unnecessary. I am happy to see more of these actors and this genre. Bring it on.
There once was a guy gone amiss
Searching vainly for day-ending bliss
There’s a gal there, too
To share the same view
Wait. Haven’t we already done this?
Rated PG-13, 98 Minutes
Director: Ian Samuels
Writer: Lev Grossman
Genre: Déjà vu
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: People who believe in a better you
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: People tired of Groundhog Day films
