I've heard the argument that Groundhog Day fails because it proposes the redemption of world-class crank Bill Murray. But, boy, does redemption fight an uphill battle against him; I suspect the criticism is misdirected at the prolific cinema of redemption in general. The finest film directed by Harold Ramis, who's been stuck in a high-concept rut since, Groundhog Day turns the titular Americana celebration into an existential pit for Phil Connors (Murray), a self-centred weatherman for a TV station he considers a way station to bigger and better gigs.

Stranded in Punxsutawney, PA after covering their Groundhog Day ceremony for the fourth year in a row (due to a blizzard he failed to predict), Phil spurns an invite to the local evening festivities from his pretty producer Rita (Andie MacDowell), opting instead for a lonesome nightcap and early sleep. Phil has an immediate sense of deja vu when a clock radio awakens him the next morning to the same broadcast as the day before; he dresses, goes downstairs, and is startled to be greeting townspeople who are on their way to the Groundhog Day ceremony. He probes them for answers--is Groundhog Day suddenly held twice a year? The next morning, deja vu all over again, and it's a time loop that only Phil is stuck in, his own private six more weeks of winter.

The film is one of the more successful "What if?" movies because it keeps fishing for ideas that will enrich the central premise, and we take pleasure in screenwriters Ramis and Danny Rubin out-fantasizing us. Phil robs an armoured car, cheats at "Jeopardy!", kidnaps the groundhog (lending the film an intertextual relationship to Ramis/Murray's Caddyshack), and when he gets pulled over by a cop for speeding, he places an order for a cheeseburger. Perhaps the keenest development in Groundhog Day comes when Phil goes on a suicide binge--Phil, as most of us, I suspect, would, rejects his immortal status, and this is the seed of his transformation: he needs to devalue his own life in order to improve it. (The film contains especially stark sequences for the unjaded Ramis, including another where Phil tries to prevent the clockwork heart attack of a homeless man.) Thereafter, he stops referring to himself as a god ("Not the God") and starts behaving like one, using his powers of foresight to positively affect the citizens of Punxsutawney, a little extra each repeated day.

This of course entails wooing Rita (mostly because Andie MacDowell is second-billed); at first he leaks info from her to later use it to his advantage (such as her favourite drink, her dislike of fudge), but eventually, his well honed, hard-won excellence speaks for itself. I should say that Bill Murray stays Bill Murray-esque until the Nora Ephron finish--as he changes a tire for a carpool of old ladies, Phil could be an idea from DC's wastebin: Supersmarm. While it's not a charmless performance like the one he gave in Scrooged (which has an arc similar to Groundhog Day's), Murray's Phil does have a little acid in his veins. This time, however, it is tempered by respect for the material and for frequent collaborator Ramis. (The bile Murray spewed in Scrooged was aimed at director Richard Donner.)

I don't think of the subversion of Bill Murray, his recent career specialty (one enjoys watching his restraint in Wes Anderson's films Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums), as among the annoyances of Groundhog Day, though the question of, If he knows a snowstorm is to hit in the afternoon, why doesn't he ever try sneaking out of town in the morning?, is.

Columbia Tri-Star has reissued Groundhog Day on DVD as a feature-light Special Edition. In addition to a pleasing 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer (that nevertheless kicks off with gritty, edge-enhanced credits and a colour palette overabundant with orange) with identical-sounding Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 options that only George Fenton's often-Fellini-esque score takes advantage of, you get a chummy, if largely rote, commentary from Ramis (we learn that Reni Santoni was a voice-over artist on the film, that sort of thing); an agreeable 25-minute looking-back called "The Weight of Time" in which MacDowell and Stephen Tobolowsky (providing a nice thematic analysis of Groundhog Day) are the only principal cast members interviewed; filmographies; and trailers for Groundhog Day, It Could Happen to You, and Peggy Sue Got Married. "The Weight of Time" confirms the rumour that Murray is philanthropic: he bought 500 danishes for a crowd that showed up to observe the shoot, just as he would later write Wes Anderson a personal cheque for a shot in Rushmore that Buena Vista refused to fund.

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening