Lovely Day

Do these two have photographic memories? (Unmarked Spoilers)

Mark (Kyle Allen) is a teen boy stuck in a time loop repeating the same day over and over again. One day he meets Margaret (Kathryn Newton), a girl his age who’s stuck in the time loop with him. After some convincing, Mark teams up with Margaret to make a map of all the perfect things happening in town to pass the time. Could this be the beginning of a beautiful romance?

I don’t usually like Groundhog Day movies because I find the repetition becomes boring after a while. Except that’s not the case here, probably because the gimmick isn’t the whole movie, it’s just the backdrop. I guess that means I’m going to have to check out that Palm Springs film, which I believe has a similar premise but for a more grown-up audience.

Eventually, Mark is told that he needs to learn to think about someone other than himself. Except does he? I mean, even before his sister told him that, he did go out of his way to help other people. He pointed out directions and stopped a guy from getting pooped on by a bird. Plus, even when it’s obvious that Margaret’s hiding something from him, he tells her she can open up to him in a way that doesn’t come off as pushy.

Of course, you could make the argument that he’s doing all of that stuff not to help but because he’s bored. He also never takes a deeper interest in other people, like asking his dad how his Civil War book is going or supporting his sister at her soccer game. Plus, by his admission, he only realized he was in a time loop when no new episode of Doctor Who came out, which does show remarkable self-centeredness.

Of course, Mark’s character development is him learning to grow out of this frame of mind. So much so that it eventually dawns on him that he’s not the hero of the story. Margaret is. So much so that the film shifts to her perspective for the final part of the movie. It’s a little jarring for the film to do that two-thirds of the way through, but it’s not that big a deal because it’s truly both of their movie.

Much like The End of the F***ing World (NSFW/spoilers), the highlight of The Map of Tiny Perfect Things is the chemistry between the two leads. They are so cute together. And both Newton and Allen turn in an equally excellent performance, which is good because there’s nothing worse than a romance movie where you don’t want the main characters to get together.

I really enjoyed The Map of Tiny Perfect Things. It manages to be both heartwarming and, at times, deeply profound. Like when Mark says that what he and Margaret are doing isn’t time because “time is the thing you spend that you can’t get back.” If you want to spend time on a movie and have Amazon Prime, I highly recommend this one.