Mediocre sci-fi Omni Loop needs the chance for a do-over

Measuring end-of-life anxiety with an open heart if not the most disciplined head, science-fiction-tinged drama Omni Loop serves up a couple nice moments for its lead performers, but otherwise relies on a viewer’s offscreen feelings about mortality to supply its punch. The result, pleasant enough but frustratingly bland, exists in a soupy, ill-defined emotional middle ground—occasionally amusing but not quite funny, and unable (or unwilling) to substantively commit to thoughtful, penetrating melancholia.

Written and directed by Bernardo Britto, the Florida-set Omni Loop centers on Zoya Lowe (Mary-Louise Parker), a theoretical physicist who, along with her husband Donald (Carlos Jacott), has written a series of academic textbooks. Diagnosed with a black hole in between her lungs, Zoya is given a week to live, and sent home to spend that time with her small family, which includes daughter Jayne (Hannah Pearl Utt).

When her nose starts to bleed during an early birthday celebration, Zoya excuses herself, slips into the bathroom and pops a regenerating pill from a bottle in her medicine cabinet, which takes her back to the hospital five days earlier. This reaction isn’t a magical, one-off fluke of some prescription medication, though; it spoils nothing (since the movie actually opens with 12-year-old Zoya finding a pill bottle) to note that she has had this ability her entire adult life.

In conflict with the terminal nature of her diagnosis, Zoya crosses paths with Paula (Ayo Edebiri), a student at a local university. Needing both lab access as well as a sounding board, Zoya recruits Paula to help attempt to unravel the chemical composition of the pills, perhaps then allowing her to stave off death.

From comedies like Groundhog Day and Palm Springs to action fare like Source Code and Edge Of Tomorrow, “replay loop” films have a rich history, their plots speaking to the imaginative possibilities (and often futility) of repeatedly trying to set things right. Omni Loop, though, offers up a fairly lackluster, back-foot treatment of its time travel concept. After injecting his movie with a few bits of daring (in addition to the pills, Zoya and Paula enlist the research assistance of an unseen scientist who is exponentially shrinking down to microscopically small levels), Britto’s script doesn’t have the guts to do much with them. Worse, it doesn’t even treat these genre elements honestly, or consistently.

While Omni Loop connects the dots a bit on Zoya’s temporal leaps professionally (a mentor lambasts her impatience, entitlement, and laziness), the film doesn’t grapple at all with what the abused ability to jump back in time has meant for her personal relationships. The post-pandemic fracturing of memory has been fertile narrative terrain in independent cinema, but the scripted origins of Omni Loop actually stretch back almost eight years, long before COVID-19, as Britto’s script was selected for the Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting Lab in 2016. Knowing that, it’s difficult to parse the chain of custody on its failures, and ascertain whether they come from half-heartedly incorporating at-odds notes or attempting to integrate disparate components from entirely different drafts over the years.

If a film isn’t going to play with the conceit of temporal repetition for comedic effect, then its engagement and catharsis are necessarily more attached to its characters’ pangs of time-bent wistfulness. A movie can funnel its narrative through a highly subjective point-of-view, or show us the power of a fractured relationship repaired. Omni Loop opts for neither; Paula especially isn’t sharply drawn, and the film fumbles its way through the one big scene that has a chance to elevate her, giving her some motivation parallel to Zoya’s.

Similarly, Zoya’s family really only exists in relief. The movie’s love story is cursory—odd, since Zoya and Donald are college sweethearts. And while there are callback moments of posed tenderness (after each reboot, Zoya awakens in her hospital bed, with Jayne purring, simply, “Hi, Mom”), the movie isn’t about a family in crisis. It simply doesn’t put down roots in anything specific enough to make one truly care.

Additionally, given the movie’s considerable 110-minute runtime, it’s disappointing that other sequences don’t build to something more emotionally affecting. Two scenes with Zoya, one with academic rival and would-be paramour Mark (Eddie Cahill) and another with his adult son Adam (Steven Maier), hint at a more interesting exploration of the unexpected impacts we can leave on others. Similarly wasted is the inclusion of Zoya’s mother Sandra (Fern Katz), which sets the table for if not some big type of end twist then at the very least a thematic stab at generational wisdom inherited. Alas, viewers don’t even get that.

There are no Charlie Kaufman-esque delights to be found around the edges, either. The black-hole-within-a-body detail (an affliction most common in astronauts or those exposed to high levels of radiation, explains a doctor with a shrug) feels dropped in from another movie. Ditto the invisible mini-scientist. Given the relative lack of absurdism present elsewhere, these bits aren’t so much whimsical background details as candy sprinkles on a savory casserole.

If the movie’s narrative is lacking, its technical package at least convincingly conveys a relaxed tone. Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith’s gently pulsing electronic score conjures up a complementary looping vibe while cinematographer Ava Benjamin Shorr’s framing and Britto and Martin Anderson’s intuitive editing create a collection of snapshot feelings.

Parker is Omni Loop’s other saving grace, and the film affords her one of her most substantial showcases in years. Though it’s not always on the page, Parker agreeably communicates Zoya’s rich inner life as a woman slowly coming to terms with the harsh reality that the shortcut advantages afforded her by these pills have in turn fed shortcomings.

Edebiri is also quite engaging. Even if her performance trades in familiar rhythms, she’s a good foil to Parker. Veteran character actor Harris Yulin, meanwhile, makes the most out of a two-scene cameo as one of Zoya’s former professors.

There are all kinds of ways Omni Loop could have landed much worse; it’s easy to envision the preening, stuffy, self-serious version of this story. But avoiding more gear-grinding problems doesn’t elevate Britto’s inert storytelling into a success, or even to the level of a bespoke curio.

Regardless of how many years on Earth we are individually granted, it is a universal experience to want more—even if not in actual time, then certainly in cherished moments relived. In fitful moments, Omni Loop touches upon this truth in beguiling fashion. Mainly, though, it is a softly mumbled affirmation of immutable truths: that not all mysteries can be solved, and not all problems fixed.

Director: Bernardo Britto
Writer: Bernardo Britto
Starring: Mary-Louise Parker, Ayo Edebiri, Carlos Jacott, Harris Yulin, Hannah Pearl Utt, Chris Witaske, Steven Maier
Release Date: September 20, 2024