Life lessons for teens
Ah me, the endless cycle of life and death. Indian philosophy calls it Sansara. In the Western literary and cinematic universe, it's known as a time loop. "Before I Fall" centres on the self discovery of its lead character Samantha Kingston (Zooey Deutsch) when she wakes up again and again and doesn't relish what she sees. That may well be the response of some viewers too; for, unlike Groundhog Day, Source Code, Run Lola Run, The Edge of Tomorrow, one isn't exhilarated by the film under review.
An ancient Greek sage (was it Socrates?) summed it beautifully, when he exhorted, "Know thyself." This slickly produced conversion narrative adapted from Lauren Oliver's bestselling debut novel for young adults, takes an hour and half of reel time to rewind the repeated reliving February 12 (christened Cupid's Day in Samantha's school) for the girl to plough through depression, denial and anger before she evolves into a better person and exits the cycle of sansara, sorry time loop.
Samantha and her girlfriends Lindsay (Halston Sage), Ally (Cynthy Wu) and Elody (Medalion Rahirri) lead a seemingly charmed life: good looks, boyfriends, well-to-do families. They seem to have everything going for them but they are also fast and mean girls. Very mean. Especially mean to Juliet (Elena Kampouris) an obviously disturbed classmate who produces frenzied black and white drawings which are a pointer to her inner turmoil.
On the way back from a party, Sam meets with an accident and dies. But then Sam wakes up seven times with deja vu, and tries to understand and deal with her relations with her family, best friends, boyfriend Rob (Kian Lawley) childhood buddy Kent (Logan Miller), and poor Juliet (Elena Kampouris) there are no references to Buddhist/Hindu worldviews but director Russo and screenwriter Maria Maggenti cleverly employ the Greek myth of Sisyphus who was eternally condemned to pushing a boulder which keeps rolling downhill.
Samantha's time loop experience then is similar to the Sisyphusian. Mercifully, she sees through the illusions that kept her from discerning what's really important in life: love, gratitude, sympathy. Life lessons for the target audience delivered by Russo through a talented cast of pretty young things.
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