Groundhog Day (1993)
Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn’t one today!
THE SUMMARY: A TV weatherman gets stuck in a bizarre blizzard-induced time loop with the same day repeating indefinitely, the ultimate choose-your-own-adventure book except the end is always back to page one, until he finally completes the plot by sleeping with his producer. The core concept is an interesting moral dilemma, but the presentation falls flat to me, and in the end, I was just as relieved as Phil to see it all over.
THE BEST:
The moral conundrum: It is said that integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching. The theme of this movie is a variation of that concept - good morals are what you do even when there are no consequences for deviating. If you knew that you could get away with absolutely anything, what would you do? How far would you go? That’s a deep question this movie stays fairly clean in exploring - to me, it would have been better darker, as explained below.
Interesting struggle with life and death: It was noteworthy that Phil struggles with both trying to end his own life and trying to save life for others - neither one of those efforts brings him satisfaction in the end. We as humans like to think we have more control over life and death than we do, in my opinion, and when we try to control it, we get bad outcomes. Ending your own life too early is not a solution. Trying to stop the inevitable for those whose time has come is not a solution either. I’m not sure this was an intended message of the movie, but it’s a message I took away.
A few good laughs: This movie has its toes in a few genres: comedy, fantasy, romance, drama, etc. Because it’s described as a comedy, I went in expecting it to be funnier than it was, but it did have a few good moments that got me laughing. Punching Ned in the face, even though I saw it coming, was satisfying. The suicide montage. The cake slice. The movie is decently funny.
THE WORST:
There is a good movie here - it’s just presented the wrong way.
What doesn’t work for me with this movie is how it tries to check all the boxes. It wants to be deep and sincere. It wants to be funny. It wants to be dramatic. It wants to be feel-good. But it doesn’t do any of these things particularly well. The comedy dilutes the sincerity, and vice versa, and keeping it light means leaving the deep, dark moral questions unexplored.
This movie would be better as something darker. If Phil’s character is actually as inconsiderate and self-centered as he’s presented to be at the start, he’d probably just take what he wants a lot more aggressively in this scenario. I’d expect that character to commit much more egregious acts than just trying to memorize French poetry or favorite drinks. I’d expect him to do worse things to his enemies than just punch them in the face. If this is a story of a bad guy turned good, make him an actual bad guy. Not just a ‘rude’ guy.The moral lessons of the movie, as presented, are dubious.
I don’t think ‘sleep with your co-worker after the first day of trying’ should be an achievement to celebrate. I know that it’s largely a metaphor, I know that for Phil it’s been many days of effort, perhaps years, but I still question how getting a chick to give it up easily is the outcome to which we should all be striving.
Is the lesson of this movie to put others first? I’m not asking rhetorically - it’s somewhat ambiguous. Phil cracks the time loop after putting other people before himself. If that is the intent, I don’t think that’s a great lesson either. Focus on yourself first, build the best version of yourself, and help others along the way - that’s a better path to a better you and a better society if everyone does the same. In defense of the movie, Phil does improve himself as well - he does develop his own skillset throughout. I’m just confused what message the movie is trying to convey.
Did Phil actually develop concern for others, or was it just circumstance that demanded it? He learned everything about everybody else, but was that from newfound compassion, or just the sheer boredom of being trapped in the time loop? Good behavior you choose is a lot more valuable than good behavior that’s compelled - it’s not clear to me that Phil had some philosophical awakening.
THE RATING: 3/5 Wickies. The lighthearted comedy softens the seriousness. The seriousness makes the comedy intermittent. I wish the movie would pick a clearer lane. Decent to good, but there’s unrealized potential.
YOUR RATING: Vote here ⬇
NEXT WEEK: TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991)
AFTER THAT? YOU PICK - VOTE! Note: ‘Max Max’ is a typo. It’s supposed to be ‘Mad Max.’ I can’t change the poll once it’s published. Sorry for the duct tape.