the groundhog day project

Beginners quite deliberately echoes itself. The movie begins with daisies in a vase on the windowsill. We'll learn later that is Oliver's mother's vase. We'll learn even near the end of the film that she had a photo of an arm holding daisies that Oliver used to remember as his arm handing her daisies. In the present he imagines it is her arm handing him daisies. Early on, Oliver gives Arthur (the dog) a tour of his apartment. Nearer the end of the film, he gives Anna a tour as well, and even later Anna gives him a tour (over the phone) of her apartment. As a child (and early in the film) Oliver's mom plays as if she's shooting him and he has to perform his death. Nearer the end of the film, of course, it is Oliver's father who dies and Oliver must play... must be the grieving son. Oliver meets Anna and she has no voice (she has laryngitis). Later, when he goes to her place in New York (that tour mentioned above), she is a disembodied voice. And, Olive...

Let us interrupt the argument regarding gender and sexuality for a for-instance: Two for-instances, I guess. A comparison—Ava putting on clothes, Ava putting on skin. With a brief follow-up to both. WARNING : there will be some naked female flesh in the skin scene. I considered making those images only visible if you click to see them, but I felt that would actually undermine what I am trying to say about that particular scene, especially when compared with the clothing scene earlier in the film. On to the first scene. For context, Ava tells Caleb to close his eyes and then she leaves to a closet, where she selects a dress. She picks out a dress. She models it in the mirror—but we do not see that mirror; we remain close on Ava. There is a very tactile and sensual thing going on here as Ava slides the dress up one arm… …before bringing it down over her body. And, we follow it down her body. Then, it is time for the stockings, and I am reminded of that bit in The Private...