the groundhog day project

A few things: I am considering something permanent to celebrate a year of Groundhog Day . A tattoo. This would be my second. I have one small one already. I finally got these videos in a format I could use. When my kids were out of town a month ago, my son sent me these. The first is my daughter Saer (who recently wrote most of an entry for this blog) reciting a certain bit of poetry from the film… The second is my son Kieran and my daughters Saer and Hayley paraphrasing a bit of god day … My screening of Groundhog Day for today is nearly done—he’s hugging Ned right now. I spent a good portion of the day working on an unrelated short film project and a card game—making Groundhog Day The Board Game and buying the blank cards I used for it (and a good many extra because they came in a box of 500), not to mention my obsession this summer with tabletop games, got me in the mood for making games. I won’t say much because a) it’s nothing to do with Groundhog Day and b) I don’t w...

Watching Tru Calling again, and Luc and Tru have known each other for more than a month now according to dialogue but Tru's brother and Tru's best friend only got together like once according to dialogue, even though those things happened a day apart if anyone would bother with actual continuity. Groundhog Day doesn't have this problem, but imagine a Groundhog Day TV series... like Day Break minus the cops and criminals or Tru Calling minus the talking dead people. It would end up having a whole lot of continuity problems. Unless they had an entire crew of writers and producers responsible for nothing but continuity. Continuity is good. Groundhog Day doesn't have much in the way of continuity errors. The Phil Sign Girl's disappearing friend is the big one. That the DJ banter and the street scene outside don't have quite the same timing from Day 1 to Day 2 would be a little one. (I've gone over errors before , so let's not linger.) Continu...

On the DVD for Groundhog Day , there's a behind-the-scenes bit called "The Weight of Time." Today, I finally watched it. Honestly, there isn't a great deal in there that is new... to me. I mean, I've listened to the Tobolowsky Files episode about Groundhog Day , I've read Rubin's book and Gilbey's book, listened to Ramis' commentary, and I've watched the movie every day for more than two months. Some of the behind-the-scenes footage is nice. I will have to try getting some screencaps (but I can't today--I am not at home so I am not on my usual computer) and make some new gifs or put some new clips on YouTube . In this blog, I haven't gotten into Bill Murray as an actor just yet--for some reason, I'm still stuck on Phil Connors as being more important--but I thought that Rubin's take on Murray's humor here was nice; he said Murray was "not afraid to be cruel." One thing I may have to get a clip of later: there...

I imagine the days where Phil Connors gets contemplative. Maybe it’s before he turns to depression. Maybe it’s after. And, a weird thought occurs to me—he can never fast. I mean, he can go without food for a day, sure. But, that’s it, a day. His digestive system will have food from the day before, so he probably won’t be all that hungry. I mean, yeah, when we’re used to eating regularly, we’ll get hungry after missing a meal. But, that’s not real hunger. There’s an interesting bit in Siddhartha in which Kamaswami asks Siddhartha what he has learned that he can give. Siddhartha’s response: “I can think. I can wait. I can fast.” Kamaswami asks, what good is fasting? He’s a businessman, a merchant who certainly doesn’t value the contemplative moments of life. Siddhartha explains: It is of great value, sir. If a man has nothing to eat, fasting is the most intelligent thing he can do. If, for instance, Siddhartha had not learned how to fast, he would have had to seek some kind of work t...

There are only a couple stray observations today. The first is about a background extra I’ve mentioned before, the girl with the upside-down Phil sign. The second is about Rita. First, have a look at these clips. You’ll see the sign girl in a long grey coat You’ll see her best in the fourth one. Day 1: Day 2: Day 3: Day 4: (First of all, a sidenote: I rather like that the position of people and cars is not exactly the same from day to day. Butterfly effect and all, people’s movements should be a little different each resumption, and the later in the day, the more they should differ.) What’s extra interesting about the fourth clip is that sign girl used to have a friend. She’s walking with someone else on Days 1, 2, and 3. But, for some reason, on Day 4, she’s alone. Now, I’ve mentioned more than once how Phil doesn’t do anything truly evil like murder. But, might we assume he’s really taking advantage of the resumptions after spending the previous night out with Ralph an...

Subtitle this one: Some interesting stuff from the commentary. That is, Harold Ramis’ commentary track from the 2002 Special Edition DVD. Directed in 1992, Ramis’ sixth collaboration with Bill Murray. (The previous five would be Meatballs , Caddyshack , Stripes , Ghostbusters , and Ghosbusters II .) Opening scene was a “reshoot” to give a little more setup. Remember, Rubin’s original screenplay started with the repetition already going. Ramis talks about the curse briefly, says it wasn’t needed. To quote Tip Top Cafe waitress Alice, “he’s right!” No explanation need apply. The song “Weatherman” was written for the film. Ramis wrote the lyrics along with George Fenton. Ramis never went to Pittsburgh. Second unit shot the aerials. The driving van aerial shot is of the actual drive up to Punxsutawney, but Punxsutawney had no “real town center” visual so they filmed in Woodstock, Illinois. Cool connection for me, since I was a History major as an undergrad—they show the courthouse ...