the groundhog day project

I have many times complained about voiceover in films. Memento is one film that absolutely lives and dies with its narration, and its black and white framing story (if you can call it that), as much as its story-in-reverse gimmick. And, I'm inclined toward a personal tangent right away. Sorry. But, in terms of Leonard's (Guy Pearce) choice to reside in a motel, having spent more time in motels in the last few years than I had in the last couple decades, I've got to say, staying in a motel is not a good way to create any real continuity in your life. Every day in a motel seems the same. If you don't put out the sign to keep the cleaning crew away, your room will be neat and your bed will be made when you've been out all day. Your stuff will still be there, but the mess and the clutter won't be so messy or so cluttered. It isn't obvious in Groundhog Day but it's the specificity--or lack thereof--of where his stuff is in his room at the Cherry Street Inn...

Board game finished, just a couple weeks until Day 365. And, some speech team folk were over tonight--still here actually--to play some games. It is 1:07 AM. I'm starting to feel like there is nothing left to say. Which seems wrong. There is always more to say. Always. ... ... Or not. Perhaps if we'd played Groundhog Day: The Board Game tonight, but we were too busy with a few rounds of We Didn't Playtest This at All , a round of Zombie Dice , Carcassonne , Tsuro , a couple long rounds of Munchkin , and now Cards Against Humanity . I will have to get my kids to try out the Groundhog Day board game again tomorrow. In the meantime, Groundhog Day was entertaining today... a lot of reciting lines along with the film, a lot of complaining about Rita (from both me and my daughter Saer). Some talk (with my sister Bobbie) about dessert for the Day 365 party. Going with some thematic links to the film. ... It isn't that it is late. It isn't that the year of Gro...

Michael Faust, in Philosophy Now , is one of those who put Phil’s transformation as something driven by his love for Rita. He says it is this love that …proves decisive. By immersing himself in ‘otherness’—by learning everything that makes MacDowell’s character tick—he is transformed. He sheds his old sexist, masculine carapace, and emerges as a far more rounded human being, in touch with his feminine side (his ‘inner other’). Claire S. Bacha, in Psychodynamic Counseling , suggests (though she sides more explicitly with Faust’s take later) instead that “Rita becomes a goal for Phil, a test.” She further adds: The film does not explain why this happens, but the feeling is that Rita becomes the object of Phil’s desire exactly because she seems so much his opposite. She possesses all the qualities that he lacks and thus becomes a challenge. Phil no longer wants himself. He wants the other. Now, both of these authors put Phil’s transformation solely in his ability to connect to “the ...