the groundhog day project

"Murray seems extremely comfortable playing an unhappy person," Chris O'Shea says in Vulture , 31 January 2013, "so it makes sense that most of the good dialogue in Groundhog Day comes when he is still being mean to people." As I mentioned yesterday, Roger Ebert, in his original review, says "Murray is funnier in the early scenes in which he is delivering sardonic weather reports and bitterly cursing the fate that brought him to Punxsutawney in the first place." By the third act, the film isn't a comedy anymore, of course, or at least not the same kind of comedy that it was before. The first act is something closer to an 80s raunchy comedy (though not particularly raunchy), the second act a straight romantic comedy (with the obvious science fiction element, of course), the third act is something... else, a poignant, humanist fairy tale (that just happens to still have some laughs). Bill Murray manages all three quite well (though perhaps the fir...

(An aside before I get going today: today in my Intercultural Communication class, we watched Gung Ho and Rick Overton, Ralph in Groundhog Day had a small but briefly important role in it. He’s 7 years younger and they barely say his character’s name but once or twice so while I noticed his name on the IMDb page, I didn’t recognize him until a good way into the film. He doesn’t have any great thematically central dialogue like “That about sums it up for me” but his getting injured on the assembly line does make for a key moment in the themes of that movie.) Today, February 12, is the anniversary of Groundhog Day ’s original release. So, let’s look back. Jerry Adler and Ray Sawhill—apparently, it took two authors to review one movie—at Newsweek , 8 March 1993*, for example, note the importance of Bill Murray’s casting in the film. “Acting a scene, Murray’s face registers a sequence of emotions as precisely as a galvanometer,” they tell us. They continue: Between expressions the...

Late Sunday night in Woodstock, with no plans to head into the square again before driving to the airport Monday morning, I realized I had neglected a location marked on my downtown map… this one: See it on the right. I had briefly walked past the spot where Phil steps in front of the moving truck but that was on the trek to Cherry Street during the second tour, and that particular spot is not part of the tour, and I didn’t even notice where we were… at the time. Realized it later but neglected to get back. So, late Sunday night, I knew I was headed into the square one more time before I left. Monday morning, I got shots in both directions (north and south) at that corner. Also, I parked right where Larry parked the van. Aside from the library photos, today’s post should exhaust, finally, my collection of photos from Woodstock. First, some random stuff (a couple of which did get on Twitter but haven’t been in this blog yet… I don’t think). First, the Groundhog Day pin ma...

Back to photos, and still Saturday, because the symposium was Saturday. That’s Craig Krandel, member of the Inner Square Committee and announcer for the symposium and the official breakfast. And, I met him Saturday morning at bowling. The audience, of course. And, Danny Rubin: After the symposium, Rubin autographed little movie posters. I stuck around on the stage, met a few of the more obsessive fans (like Kyle Sweeney) and talked a bit with Mitchell Olson (the host of the symposium). I wrote my blog that day at the bar in the Pour House, just a few feet from this: The next morning, it was cold but there was no more snow falling. And, of course there was the prognostication. Then, the official breakfast at the VFW. Craig mentioned me early on. But, there was breakfast service, the high school girls singing group Premium Blend, and a polka band playing before I got to go on stage to kick off the Groundhog Day trivia contest. I sat at a ...