the groundhog day project

Day 363 seems, to me, like a perfectly reasonable recap number. Consider: I recapped on Day 62 . That is hardly a good, obvious, round number. Day 60—that would make sense, but that day, I was busy nitpicking Maggie Crane of Woodstock, IL. And, now I’ve namechecked her again, which is not only rude but, well, somewhat pre-loop Phil Connorsian— Yes, that’s a thing. Anyway, I recapped again on Day 121 . Again, not a good, obvious, round number. Day 120 would have made more sense, but I was busy tying impromptu quotations to Groundhog Day . I recapped again on Day 180 and Day 240 , and Day 300 because I do know how to do things on nice, obvious, round numbers. So, now, the Day 363 recap: Day 301: you never talk about work was a sort of behind-the-scenes look at the research—deliberate and more casual—that goes into this blog. Day 302: what high school did you go to? deals with the short film, The Other Side of Yesterday before moving on to the high school lives of the likes ...

Thirty-one minutes into the movie tonight before I start writing. I don’t have much to say. But, I did want to share the following photos, for those who can’t make the Day 365 Party on Friday. I made some stickers for a few signs in the crowd, the big sign behind the stage and the banner hanging over that. I’m usually a LEGO purist—I occasionally enter contests so I never use non-LEGO pieces in a LEGO set—but I thought I could make an exception just this once. And, really, that is all for today. Just a few days left. I just went a while without typing anything—1 hour 5 minutes in, Phil just jumped to his death—but I figure on having something more to say in the next couple entries… actually, tomorrow’s entry should be the final recap entry, detailing all the entries since Day 300 . Day 364 will mostly be my “final” thoughts on Groundhog Day and on doing this project. Day 365, I hope I will have words from some of you to share with everyone else, plus a recap of the goings o...

It seems like I write about Bill Murray every day. But, really, I think I only ever focused on him once or twice. I know there was Day 196 – keep the talent happy , for example, in which I place Groundhog Day in context of his larger career, but without actually getting into a lot of detail about each and every film he’s been in because that would be tedious. I wrote about Murray’s feud with Harold Ramis on Day 214 – i am not making it up and I wrote a little bit about Murray’s marriages in on Day 267 – this glass is half empty … usually I just write about Phil Connors instead of Bill Murray. But, today, for practical reasons— I think I’ve mentioned my folder of unused Groundhog Day articles; well, it’s got nothing but Bill Murray articles left inside —and because I can generally label myself as something of a completist— seriously, it bugs the hell out of me, for example, when the new set of collectible LEGO minifigures come out and I’m missing just one; similarly, as I’ve gott...

Watching Boyhood this morning, and a few times there were things I expected might happen that didn’t. The movie—if you don’t know it—was filmed over 12 years and evokes a sense of real life more than the Hollywood-constructed life. A boy doesn’t turn into a man in a single summer that lends itself easily to film—at least not all the time. It takes years. But, anyway, those moments. For example, Mason camps out with some other teenager boys at a house under (mostly done) construction and they’re drinking beers and breaking bits of wood, kicking them while another boy holds them. And, they also throw a saw blade into a spare bit of what looks like sheetrock. So, the end of the scene, oldest boy is going to punch a board held by the one kid who doesn’t want to drink, he’s holding it right in front of his face, and that saw blade is in the wall behind him. In a scripted film—especially a Final Destination film—this is a setup for a horrible injury and a lesson learned about going out ...

Maxim Gorky once said of Anton Chekhov, “Beautifully simple himself, he loved everything simple, real, and sincere.” Schmidt (1997) expands on this, saying, “Simplicity was his touchstone for art. He hated pretentiousness and fuss” (p. 2). I’d wager Chekhov, like Harold Ramis, was a beloved writer who the theatergoing masses loved. Schmidt, again, tells us, All Chekhov’s plays are based on the traditional themes of middle-class melodrama: hopeless love, money, marriage, and who owns the house. In that sense, he was a playwright of his time, trying to write the kind of plays audiences wanted. It’s important to remember that in his lifetime his most popular plays, and the ones that made money, were the one-act comic “sketches” he wrote over a period of five years. These he wrote easily and quickly, because the comic sketch was the genre with which he began as a writer. (p. 3) This is not the Chekhov Phil Connors speaks of, one who “saw the bleak winter [and] saw a winter bleak and dar...

The yurodivy is a kind of "holy fool" - the person who sees what's really going on in society and has the audacity to say it, but only in a kind of code. If there's a crooked government, the holy fool will maybe perform a weird pantomime or tell a story, one that gets everyone to laugh at first; sooner or later, the more perceptive members of the yurodivy 's audience will also recognize in the fool's antics a hidden message. – ( Saint Paul Sunday ) The… article quoted above goes on to use Gogol’s Dead Souls as an example, and I loved that book (though I admit I probably didn’t get all of the nuance of its satire). Groundhog Day isn’t satire, though. Still, it comments so readily on the human condition in the modern world, repetition and inanity hitting us from all side. Yesterday, I suggested a) that Ralph and Gus were Phil’s holy fools and b) that Phil was ours. Phil’s sarcasm, his dry wit, his sardonic humor—this is all him commenting on the world, sure...

William Shakespeare never made use of the time loop. Which is unfortunate, really. And yet, I find my viewing of Much Ado About Nothing this evening bringing me back around to Groundhog Day nonetheless. Really, I suppose, at this point, everything leads me to Groundhog Day , or vice versa, or both. Groundhog Day binds me and undoes me, and I remain and I change and neither the same nor different will I be when this Project has come to its first end. Or its second end, if one does count the beginning of the line of its progress as one end, and the finish of it as its second. (Forget for now that that second end may be naught but a new beginning for a secondary phase of that which has been singular but now will expand and include much more.) I need to work on my Shakespearean writing. I think I end up just creating convoluted sentences to convey simple ideas. But, anyway, Dogberry in particular, if not the love story betwixt man and woman who come late to their attraction, brin...

A few notes and that is all for today. That New York Times article I mentioned a good while ago—reporter I talked to in Woodstock in February—that isn’t happening. I don’t know if I should share details, but the article is supposed to happen, different publication and probably not until winter (think Groundhog Day-ish). Another thing I currently am feeling I should keep details under wraps… someone who is in Groundhog Day sent me a message today in response to a message I wrote about the Day 365 Party next week. On a long shot, I asked if he would attend or send a message to those who do. The conversation is ongoing. More publically, the Overview with Rick Overton , AKA Ralph in Groundhog Day , now follows the Groundhog Day Project on Twitter . I feel the need to write about Ralph now. But not today. It has been a long day. Borrowed a projector for the Day 365 Party, by the way, and this evening I watched Groundhog Day projected onto the wall of the living room. While I could ...

Captain Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) wakes on a train outside Chicago. He sits across from a girl he doesn’t know (Michele Monaghan as Christina Warren), and she refers to him as Sean. It hadn’t occurred to me in regard to Groundhog Day being filmed nearby (and partly within the city) that Chicago is a great city to film a time loop movie—they call their train “The Loop.” Anyway, before Groundhog Day today is Source Code . Train explodes, Stevens wakes up in the dark... seems like a sensory deprivation tank... at first. Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) asks him about where he was and what he saw. Can’t be a deprivation tank because Stevens has some sort of backpack on, and there’s a video screen where he can see Goodwin. (I know where he is, but I don’t feel like SPOILING it yet.) Stevens was on the train to figure out who bombed it. He’s got 8 minutes each time. And, he’s back on the train again. Loop markers: Christina telling him she took his advice. A woman spills her co...

Dr. Benjamin Stone (Michael J. Fox) is headed for Beverly Hills. Another doctor, one who will not be seen again in this movie, critiques his choices because cosmetic surgery is clean and no one dies... apparently medicine is only meaningful when it is a matter of life and death. Oh, watching Doc Hollywood before Groundhog Day today. If you haven’t seen it, think Cars minus the cars, and Lightning McQueen is a doctor instead of a professional racer. Apparently it’s based on a book—”What? Dead... Again?” Who knew? I’ve seen this move numerous times and would not have expected an actual source... not to imply that all book sources involve some clearly noticeable depth. Anyway, like Phil Connors getting stuck in Punxsutawney, Dr. Stone is about to get stuck in Grady after he gets off the main road to avoid traffic and ends up crashing his Porsche convertible into a fence. Problem is, the local judge built that fence, so Dr. Stone is sentenced to community service. Initially, only 1...

Seven friends gather for a housewarming party. Pizza arrives. A die is rolled that create six different timelines. This is Community ‘s “Remedial Chaos Theory” episode. Having written about some alternate reality movies lately and also playing a lot of tabletop games lately—in some of which the roll of a die or the the drawing of a certain card decides your identity. First timeline, Annie goes. Pierce makes a remark about having sex with Eartha Kitt. Britta smokes marijuana in the bathroom, Jeff hits his head on the fan. Second timeline, Shirley goes, Britta goes to the bathroom again. Pierce makes a remark about having sex with Eartha Kitt. Jeff hits his head on the fan. Shirley’s pies get burned because she went downstairs for the pizza. Third timeline, Pierce goes, after making a remark about Eartha Kitt. Britta goes to the bathroom, but Troy joins her after getting upset when Jeff and Annie make fun of his apartment. Jeff hits his head on the fan and Annie checks his wound. ...

”Anything might have been anything else and had as much meaning to it” --Tennessee Williams, “The Malediction” The thought is a complicated one—and I’ll get to it below—but first, I like the idea of that quotation given what I’ve been doing with this blog a lot, lately; I’ve been sublimating my interest in Groundhog Day with other—albeit thematically-related—films. The discussion continues, though the angle is twisted. Tonight it was Mr. Nobody , a film that doesn’t deal in a time loop but does deal in disjointed time and alternate realities based on choices—a lot like Run Lola Run , Sliding Doors , Blind Chance . Nemo Nobody (Jared Leto) is the last mortal human in the year 2092 (maybe), and he is either being hypnotized by a guy with facial tattoos or being interviewed by a reporter using a tape recorder he “borrowed” from a museum. He’s recalling his life, especially certain moments where choices led to his life changing one way or another (or sometimes another). He’s tellin...

Many people thought I would run out of things to say about Groundhog Day long before Day 365 (another 2 weeks away). This evening, as I sit down to watch the film and write something about or inspired by it, I have an inkling not that they are right, but that I had too much other stuff to do today. Work on my card game, work on my short film, a trip to the science center with my daughter. And, I didn’t even get to revising my paper to be published or prepping lesson plans for my speech class for the fall, or even going over a lesson plan for the speech practice this Wednesday. Made dinner, got Saer to Improv class, and now here I am… sitting… with nothing particular to say. I got out my Chekhov book so I would remember to read one of his plays. I’ve got 2 outings of a sort in the next couple weeks (before the Day 365 party) for this blog, but I cannot do either of those at 10:00 P.M. on a Friday. As for topics at hand, my folder of unused Groundhog Day -related articles has a handfu...