Man, what a masterpiece!

Rating: 10/10 (28 January 2005)

1993 was a wonderful movie year. 2 movie masterpieces stand out today from it; "Schindler's list" and "Groundhog day". Personally, I always loved the second one more. "Groundhog day" is a perfect example why Bill Murray will always be a superior actor than the Oscar darlings Tom Hanks and Spencer Tracy. He plays Phil whom thanks to a time distortion ( a day repeating itself again and again ) gets away with stealing money, committing suicide 20 times, sleeping with local girls without consequences and finding out everyones deepest secrets.
The story is so subtle that you may at first think its just a comedy. But once you think about it, you will realize how almost every problem from life is contained in it. Most noticeable, the one about how people will make the same mistakes again and again, until they change. And that's what's all about: change. Once when Phil changes himself, the world changes finally too. He is a grown man, but childish in his persona. That's why thanks to the time distortion he ages psychologically, until he finally becomes a real man, not a spoiled kid. This is an extreme satire about life. Think about it. Its about the imprisoned human spirit crying for a change, a difference. Phil became an individual, the only person on Earth that has self-consciousness. At that moment all other characters just became puppets. You can also regard it as a parody of Totalitarian regimes ( Phil is the only person that does something different than the others, and that's why he is misunderstood ). Plus the explanation for the mysterious time distortion is never given. It's shown more like something as natural as the weather, something that just happened.
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The only great film the director Harold Ramis ever made, "Groundhog day" was until recently the highest marked Murray film on the site rotten-tomatoes.com with extremely high average grade of 8.1/10. "Lost in translation" beat it, with 8.4/10, but quite frankly, it was overrated. If there was any justice, "Groundhog day" should have won Oscars and Golden Globes for the best picture, script and the main actor. But alas, since Murray was underrated for so long, its finally time he gets overrated for once!
You just have to love him when he is in the studio doing a weather forecast: "In California there is going to be a big heat tomorrow, and gang fights and too high real estate prizes too. Oh, what's this? A cold front is coming up! Fuuuu( blows the clouds on the screen)." The only flaw is that some better director could have directed it more radical and extreme than Ramis, but if we love Frank Capra, we must love this symbolic story about the triumph of emotions over cold cynicism.
Grade: 10/10