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movie review - Groundhog Day

This is the original of a "man caught in a time loop" stories. By that I mean, the lead character is caught in the same day (Groundhog Day, 1996) every time he wakes up at 06:00. I saw this in the theater when it came out and enjoyed it at the time, then saw it again in 2002. but upon this viewing I realized that it is quite a bit more sophisticated than I'd realized. For one thing, he doesn't stay inside the loop until he falls in love, which is how most people seem to interpret it. He stays inside the loop until he's reached the point of building character that he's worthy of everyone's love. That's a huge difference. This is essentially the same final purpose that the characters in The Good Place set for the afterlife, and it rhymes pretty heavily with the goals of Buddhism, where we reach enlightenment to escape the attachment that leads to pain.

The story leads us through the characters various stages of dealing with his situation, ranging from suicide to exploiting the situation to desperately flailing. At some point, we see him come to terms with the situation and begin to change. And I mean really change. I won't say more but as an adult of advancing years I was very impressed.

A favorite. I'm very glad I watched this again. I'm also glad we watched this instead of "Schindler's List", which was The Boy's first choice. We didn't have time and a gloomy night in December is not the time.

P.S. This movie unintentionally raises a question about how long the main character is in his loop. Given the things he taught himself, and the depth of knowledge he's built with everyone, I would say it's a minimum of fifteen years. The main character did indeed have some work to do on himself, but he transcended all of that and became quite something indeed. Fifteen years of Groundhog Day!