Before The Fall starring Zoey Deutch is a genuinely involving teen drama

REVIEW: Before The Fall is very much a Groundhog Day: The Next Generation affair, with Zoey Deutch respectably filling the shoes of Bill Murray.

BEFORE I FALL (M)

Director: Ry Russo-Young (Nobody Walks)

Starring: Zoey Deutch, Halston Sage, Logan Miller, Kian Lawley, Elena Kampouris, Jennifer Beals.

Rating: 3 stars

Always dying to learn her lesson.

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While it might be based on the best-selling young adult novel by Lauren Oliver, a classic movie looms largest as an influence on a genuinely involving teen drama.

This is very much a Groundhog Day: The Next Generation affair, with appealing rising star Zoey Deutch (Everybody Wants Some!!) doing a respectable job of filling the well-worn shoes of Bill Murray.

KONG: SKULL ISLAND — a movie worthy of the King

It is Groundhog Day for Zoey Deutch as Sam in Before I Fall. Picture: Village Roadshow

Deutch plays Sam, a serenely self-obsessed high-schooler suddenly living the same day over and over. A day which traditionally ends with Sam perishing in a car crash that also kills her three bitchy best friends.

As in Groundhog Day, Sam goes searching for an opening inside this closed loop of time to stop a tragic history repeating itself.

Zoey Deutch and friends in a scene from Before I Fall.

It does some time — but not too long, thankfully — for Sam to realise that a party that lays bare the socially excluding ways of her snarky peers is the place she should be looking for clues.

Though this movie is a clear notch below recent high watermarks of its genre such as Diary of a Teenage Girl and Edge of Seventeen, it does extract some pressing and lasting insights from the experience of a life lived like there is literally no tomorrow.

Sam has to find a way out of history repeating itself.

Originally published as Before The Fall starring Zoey Deutch is a genuinely involving teen drama