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. Maybe the finest film yet directed by Harold Ramis (who's been stuck in a high-concept rut since), Groundhog Day turns the titular Americana celebration into an existential abyss for Phil Connors (Murray), a self-centred weatherman for a TV station he considers a pit stop on the way to bigger and better things.

Stranded, due to a blizzard he failed to predict, in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania after covering their annual Groundhog Day ceremony, 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. An immediate sense of déjà vu overcomes him when he awakens the next morning to the same radio broadcast as that of the day before. He dresses, goes downstairs, and is startled to find himself greeting townspeople claiming to be headed for the Groundhog Day ceremony. He probes them for answers: is Groundhog Day suddenly held twice a year? The next morning, déjà 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 co-screenwriters Ramis and Danny Rubin out-fantasizing us. Phil robs an armoured car, cheats at "Jeopardy!", and 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 sees Phil going on a suicide binge: as most of us, I suspect, would, Phil rejects his immortal status--and this is the seed of his transformation, for he needs to devalue his own life in order to improve it. (The film contains especially stark sequences for the unjaded Ramis, including one 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 use it to his advantage the following day (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 Marvel's reject pile: 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. But where the bile Murray spewed in Scrooged was aimed at director Richard Donner, this time it's tempered by his respect for the material and for frequent collaborator Ramis.

I don't think of the subversion of Bill Murray, his recent career specialty (one enjoys watching his restraint in Wes Anderson's 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 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer (that nevertheless kicks off with gritty, edge-enhanced credits and a colour palette overabundant with orange) with an accompanying Dolby Digital 5.1 remix that only George Fenton's often Fellini-esque score uses to its advantage, 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 check for a shot in Rushmore that Buena Vista refused to fund.-Bill Chambers

*The disc does not contain a DTS 5.1 track as originally advertised.

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DVD VITALS:
Running Time
101 minutes
MPAA
PG-13
Aspect Ratio(s)
1.78:1 ONLY, 16x9-enhanced
Languages
English DD 5.1,
English Dolby Surround,
French Mono,
Spanish Mono,
Portuguese Mono
CC
Yes
Subtitles
English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, Thai
DVD-9
Region One
Columbia Tri-Star

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Published: January 21, 2002