Kierkegaardian Comedy

Rating: 10/10 (11 March 2007)

Harold Ramis' Groundhog Day (1993) is as a film one would not have anticipated from a man whose previous films included Club Paradise, National Lampoon's Vacation and Caddyshack. These previous films were the broadest of comedies, thinly scripted and redeemed only fitfully by the talents of its stars. While still a comedy, Groundhog Day is a character-based story that, in the end, is a deeply moral film.
Bill Murray initially plays to type as Phil Connors, a shallow, egotistical, dead-ended weather man, sent to Punxsutawny, PA to cover the annual Groundhog Day event. It is an empty assignment for an empty man. In response, he is an arrogant prick to his film crew and the locals. Unexpectedly, the crew gets snowed in by a blizzard. Phil tucks in for the night in a B&B, but awakens in the morning to find it is still Groundhog Day. He is repeating the same events as previously, stuck in Punxsutawny, yet only he is aware of this.
The film loops through seemingly endless repetitions of the day (at least 33 depicted according to the Wikipedia, but implicitly up to 3600 according to Harold Ramis). At first Phil tries to take advantage of the situation, memorizing all the nuances of the day so he can better manipulate things. The principle target of his plans is Rita, his producer, played by Andie MacDowell. At first they are like oil and water, but as the day repeats he learns her favorite drinks, her dreams and desires. As the repetitions go past, each time he gets a little further in his seduction. At one point, he comes near to the perfect night, but takes one small misstep. From there on, his performance becomes more and more stilted until he realizes he has lost his rhythm and ardor for the pursuit.
He sinks into a deepening depression. Drunk and disheveled, he kidnaps the groundhog, Punxsutawny Phil, (no accident their common name, both trapped in a single day) carrying both of them to their deaths in gravel pit. Nevertheless, he awakens in the morning again on Groundhog Day. Multiple attempts at suicide fail similarly. He robs the bank, seduces waitresses, but life seems increasingly empty. Then he encounters a bum who dies in an alley, and he is moved to act. The next time, he takes the old fellow to a diner and fills his stomach, but still he dies. He takes him next to a hospital, but he still dies. Chastened by the finality of death, frustrated, he choses honesty with Rita as they have their morning breakfast. Walking her through his day, she almost believes him and they have a genuine day and evening together, though we he awakes his plight is the same.
The film is an enactment of the Kierkegaardian stages of life. Phil starts in the aesthetic stage, interested only in personal enjoyment and the life of the senses. At the start of the movie, he has already reached a dead-end with this approach. He is played out and at sea with himself. Midway through the movie he passes through despair and advances into the ethical stage, becoming aware of the moral implications of action. Despite the fact that his entire life is limited to a single day doomed to endless repetition, he resolves to make a difference. Daily he changes the flat tire of some little old ladies, catches a boy falling from a tree, learns the lives of everyone in town, takes piano lessons, learns ice sculpturing, teaches himself French, and actually becomes a thoughtful and effective weatherman. By the end, he approaches the religious stage, devoting himself selflessly to others. Only then does he realizes an authentic and spontaneous union with Rita. As a result, the next day he awakes with Rita back in real time.
The movie is among the most seriously moral films, a lesson in existential philosophy disguised as a Bill Murray comedy. He gives here the first glimpses of the subtlety he would later develop as an actor. The Writer's Guild has ranked the script 27th on a list of the 101 greatest scripts, and the IMDb rates it in the top 250 movies of all time. Snatch it up should you find it in your local remainder bin.
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