The Dangers of the Time Loop
Judd Apatow’s next film may be a time-travel comedy/romance.
So far, this is just a rumor, but here’s the synopsis:
A couple going through a divorce who travel back in time to their Hawaiian wedding to convince their younger selves not to get married, only to realize they still love each other.
Will this film mark a resurgence for Apatow?
The legendary comedic director (The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up), after years of unsuccessful pitches, mostly making documentaries in the interim (George Carlin's American Dream, The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling), fired his agent of 30 years and switched to WME.
Apatow’s last narrative, The Bubble (2022), did not have the same comedic magnetism as his mid-2000s work.
So, the degree to which his new film succeeds will be entirely based on the quality of the script and, thus, Apatow’s understanding of the pitfalls and potential of the time travel genre.
The prime example of a time travel film that involves comedic and romantic elements is, and forever will be, Groundhog Day (1993). The brilliant Harold Ramis-directed Bill Murray-starring film revolved around a miserable son-of-a-bitch weatherman (Murray) who is eternally dissatisfied because he believes he is God's gift to the earth and, therefore, much too good to work at his local news station where he lets this be known by making those around him feel miserable.
So when he is forced to do what he considers a hell-on-earth job of trudging to Punxsutawney, PA, to report on the world's “dullest” holiday, Murray is thrown into an existentially brilliant time loop.
And we never find out why.
There’s no alien DNA (Edge of Tomorrow), time machines (Primer), or magical hot tubs (Hot Tub Time Machine); the only reason for Murray to be subjected to this time loop is so he can grow as a character.
And he does so brick by brick, over the course of what has been estimated at 33 years, or living the same day over and over 12,000 times.
What makes the film brilliant is the delta from Murray’s selfish weatherman at the start of the movie to where he lands at the end of the film: a legitimately selfless man who has gone through the heights of hell to change.
Then there are those time loop films that don’t work, but there’s one in particular that has the greatest single moment in a time travel film of this century, that’s what we’ll turn to next.