Lost in Translation

 SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed!

Lost in Translation (2003), written and directed by Sofia Coppola (she won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay), has at its center two people who feel alienated from others and maybe even themselves as they search for what they want. This sense of feeling “lost” is dramatized by placing the main characters in a foreign land where they are not able to connect to the inhabitants due to the inability to understand the native language and some customs.

Bob Harris (Bill Murray) is an actor who is in Japan to do a whiskey commercial for a nice sum of money which he can use since his show business career has stalled. Tokyo is a modern city lit up like New York, but all the electric signs are in Japanese, which reminds Bob he is the foreigner, the outsider. Bob even sees himself in an advertisement, with Japanese writing next to his face, stressing familiarity and strangeness at the same time. Bob makes a bit or a racist joke about how his greeting is “short and sweet,” and, so, very Japanese. He does stand out as the tall one in the elevator, emphasizing how he is out of place. He receives a message from his wife, Lydia, that says he forgot his son’s birthday. It indicates that he is estranged from his family, which indicates his solitary situation.

He sits on his bed listening to classical music and looks inanimate, as if entropy has taken him over. At the hotel bar two young men recognize him and talk about a car chase in one of his films. He responds minimally to them, and escapes. He does not want the superficial and awkward intrusion of fans. He’s jet-lagged and can’t sleep. The communications he receives from his wife are not about how he is missed but instead are faxes about house remodeling which shows how removed from emotion their relationship has become. Bob’s out-of-sync existence here is stressed by curtains sliding open automatically letting bright light in his room in the morning, forcing him to wake up. And, the shower head only fits at a level that does not accommodate Bob’s taller height.

Charlotte, (Scarlett Johansson) is also sleepless in Tokyo. She is the young wife of John (Giovanni Rabisi), a very busy photographer who has little time for her and basically abandons her in Tokyo. John sleeps soundly, at peace with his life. He runs out in the morning with a drive-by “I love you,” to Charlotte as he rushes out the door. Charlotte is in her underwear a great deal in her room, suggesting she isn’t ready to meet the outside, alien world.

At the shoot for the whiskey commercial, the Japanese director goes on in his native tongue about what he wants. The translator says the director said, “he wants you to turn, look into the camera.” The perplexed Bob asks, “That’s all he said?” That confusion continues throughout the scene. What we have here is a failure to communicate (which is the famous line delivered by Strother Martin in Cool Hand Luke, a story about another outsider).

Charlotte is also experiencing alienation. She goes to a Buddhist shrine that has chanting monks. She wanted to feel something, make a connection to this far-off culture. But, she retreats to her womb-like hotel room and says in a phone conversation that she couldn’t feel anything at this religious place. She tries to express her solitary pain in the phone call but the person on the other end is distracted. Charlotte cries afterwards, showing how desolate she feels. When John returns for a bit all he talks about is his experiences.

Bob watches TV in his room and with everything in Japanese, he can’t find any distraction from his being ill-at-ease in this foreign country. It is funny and upsetting when he watches an old clip of himself dubbed into Japanese.

Then comes the hysterical “Premium Fantasy” woman (Nao Asuka) scene. She is sent by one of Bob's hosts. She shows her exposed leg with thigh-high stockings, and it sounds like she wants him to “lip” them when she actually means “rip” them. It is supposed to be some strange sexual role-playing, as she falls to the floor as if not wanting to be touched and then wanting to be. Bob is confused and embarrassed by this awkward bit of miscommunication.

Bob eats breakfast alone, but Charlotte is just as solitary walking anonymously in a crowd. Bob goes to a photo shoot for stills for the whiskey promotion. He makes jokes since the direction he receives sounds strange to him. For example, he is told to act like “007,” but he comments that James Bond drinks martinis. The director asks for “more,” or does he mean Roger Moore? More (pun intended) confusion.

Bob again seeks refuge in the hotel bar where the lounge singer (Catherine Lambert) performs in an overly dramatic manner. She sings American songs in a way that is not comforting to the visitors. Bob and Charlotte exchange amused looks and gestures across the room concerning the singing. In contrast to what has happened to them so far, there is a connection between them that doesn’t even require words. She is at a table with her husband and others but feels uninvolved with their words. She sends over what looks like sake to the appreciative Bob.

There are several funny quick scenes which show the effects of feeling out of touch with the surroundings. One such slapstick bit occurs when Bob gets caught on a runaway elliptical machine which he can’t control since it only responds to Japanese commands.

John runs into a previous photo client, a flirtatious actress named Kelly (Anna Faris). The two talk and Charlotte looks like she isn’t even there, which shows how one can be left out of the loop even when one’s own language is spoken. Kelly is going under the name “Evelyn Waugh,” which, as Charlotte notes to John, is the name of a male writer. The scene shows how inaccurate language can be if ignorance is involved.

After both can’t sleep and or find anything desirable on TV, Bob (who tries to talk to the bartender who wanders off – again no communication) and Charlotte meet in the hotel bar and begin to talk. When she asks what he is doing there, he is very frank, probably aching, despite his glibness, to connect with someone. He says he is “taking a break from his wife,” and has forgotten his son’s birthday. He is getting paid two million dollars instead of doing a play, which shows how he is admitting to being an artistic sellout. He says the “whiskey works,” so he can get a laugh to soften his opening confessional remarks. She notes that his twenty-five years of marriage is “impressive,” but he deflates her admiration by saying one sleeps one third of an individual’s life, so that brings it down to “sixteen and change.” As IMDb notes, Charlotte finds her husband and later others of her age as being superficial. She is intelligent and searching for answers, as she went to the Buddhist shrine and listens to an audio book about finding one’s true self. Perhaps that is why an older man, like Bob, might have more to offer. He says that when one is young and gets married, “you can drive but there’s still the occasional accident,” which can give hope to someone younger who is having marital questions. She notes that he may be having a “mid-life crisis.” She says that her major was philosophy,” the impractical study of a questioning youth. The older, cynical Bob says, “There’s a lot of money in that racket.” Instead of being upset she jokes by saying so far it’s been “pro bono.” They are beginning to understand each other.

Charlotte decides to go with John to the bar for a meet-up with Kelly. He is reluctant because he knows she doesn’t connect with Kelly, but she wants to spend some time with her husband. The conversation is vapid, including Kelly’s urging to have a “power cleanse.” Charlotte tells a DJ there talking about hip-hop music that she doesn’t know what he is talking about, which pretty much sums up her situation. Charlotte eyes Bob at the bar, who pretends to fall over, as if channeling what she is going through. She walks over to him, and he tells her he is “trying to organize a prison break,” to basically get out of the country. He wants an accomplice, and she says she is “in.” The scene is funny, but it also reveals how they feel trapped by their respective lives.

The soundtrack has a muted, dreamy feel to it, which reflects the unreal sense of being in a faraway land. Bob and Charlotte both use the hotel pool, and those familiar with The Graduate and Ordinary People know how that water experience can symbolize drifting with no direction. Charlotte asks Bob if he wants to come out with her to see some of her friends that live in Japan. He had said that he would be spending the week in the bar, another form of being lost in a liquid environment, so her invitation may be a wish to rescue him.

On the night out they are very relaxed with each other except when Bob arrives at Charlotte’s room. She notes how loud his shirt is by again mentioning his mid-life crisis. He goes into her bathroom and takes off his shirt to turn it inside out. Charlotte looks away, a bit embarrassed by this quick show of intimacy. The party with Charlotte’s Japanese friend, nicknamed Charlie Brown (Fumihiro Hayashi), has all young people there. Despite the age difference and even though there is still the language barrier, Bob has fun because he is with a kindred soul. When Charlotte sings her song, Bob repeats the word “special” as he looks at her. When he sings, he turns to her, as if dedicating his song to her. (When Murray sings karaoke, it brings up memories of his singing on Saturday Night Live). When she goes outside the room for a smoke break, Bob joins her and again they communicate without talking as he takes a drag from her cigarette and she leans her head on his shoulder showing how comfortable they have become with each other. When they get back to the hotel Charlotte is asleep and Bob carries her to her room. He tucks her in and there is a conflicting look on his face as she closes her eyes to go to sleep, which may be part lustful and part parental.

Bob seeks an affectionate connection with his wife on the phone as he shares what happened during the evening. She sent him carpet samples earlier and he says he thinks her choice was the best, but he doesn’t care about something so mundane. He just wants to attempt to reconnect with her. She hangs up before she can hear him say, “I love you.” They are out of sync in their time zones (she is getting up to take the kids to school and it’s the middle of the night for him) and in their feelings.

More great dialogue ensues when they go to a sushi restaurant. Bob again notes the culture clash when he says his shiatsu massage replaced his muscle tightness with “unbelievable pain.” She stubbed her toe, and he looks at it, saying it appears “dead” and he can’t allow her to put it “back in the shoe.” He says either she goes to a doctor or she must leave the toe there. He calls it “black toe,” and suggests they might serve it at the restaurant, exaggerating the type of food the Japanese eat. He employs fractured English and calls it “brack toe.” (There is a lapse in political correctness in the film since he uses the difference in cultures to elicit humor. However, there are beautiful scenes involving religious, social and marriage rituals).

Bob takes Charlotte to a hospital and again there is no understanding what the information clerk says so they must wing it even when it comes to a health issue. There was a good deal of improvisation in the film, because, after all, you have Murray to work with. As he waits for Charlotte to be seen, Bob tries to imitate Japanese with a patient speaking to him in his native language. Bob’s responses are so off the mark that there are two ladies in the background getting hysterical as they listen to Bob’s fractured Japanese. One of my favorite playful lines in the film occurs after Charlotte gets an x-ray of her toe (where, of course, she has no idea what the doctor is saying). Bob is waiting for her with a huge stuffed penguin doll. She asks if it’s for her and he says, “Yeah, it can be for you,” acting as if he bought it for himself.

Despite their bonding, there are several scenes still where Bob and Charlotte are by themselves, looking for diversion from their loneliness. Bob plays golf by himself, and Charlotte looks at pictures of herself and John, which suggests that she only has memories of how nice it once was between her and her husband. It could be that she sees Bob’s failing marriage as a foreshadowing of her own marital collapse.

Charlotte calls Bob and says he can meet her and Charlie and his friends at a club. It turns out to be a strip club and there is an almost naked woman contorting her body to the sounds of a sexually explicit song. When Charlotte arrives she asks where Charlie is. Bob hysterically says he is taking “dance lessons,” as she sees Charlie ogling the woman dancer. She wants to leave and again Bob is on the same page as her even if their surroundings are not.

Both still have insomnia, and given how long this inability to sleep has been going on it indicates the depth of their alienation. They spend time in Bob’s room. He notes her sadness since he has hardly seen her smile. Charlotte demonstrates her perplexity with the Japanese language, and Bob jokes that the locals switch the r’s and the l’s for “yuks” since the natives are not amused by the foreigners. When in doubt, he goes for the laughs to make it easier to deal with unknowable stuff. She says, “Let’s never come here again because it would never be as much fun.” Her line says so much. It shows how she is enjoying his company. It also indicates that she sees them as not ending their relationship because it points to future experiences together. However, it also shows how some joy is fleeting, and can never be recaptured.

They lie in bed next to each other and have a serious conversation. She says she is “stuck,” not knowing what she wants to be. She tried writing and photography, and felt she wasn’t measuring up. She wants to know if finding yourself gets easier. He reassures her that once she matures she will be more self-assured. She appreciates his honesty about how “hard” marriage can be since his wife used to need him around and now she doesn’t. He frankly admits that having kids is scary, but eventually is very rewarding. They are emotionally intimate, and the only physical contact occurs when he touches her foot, and this act is sweet and tender.

Originally, Bob wanted to get out of the country as soon as possible and that is why he didn’t want to do a talk show in Tokyo. But he now says he will extend his stay and do the show since he doesn’t want to leave Charlotte any sooner than he must. The talk show host is very over-the-top, wearing clothes that look like he stole the material from an awning. He does a strange welcoming dance and Bob, as usual, looks like he walked through the looking glass into a strange new world.

Bob receives a call from his wife while he is in a tile tub filled with water. She says the burgundy carpet he liked is not in stock and he should pick out another color. He says she should pick it out because, “I’m completely lost.” When she implies that he is making a big deal over a carpet color he says, “That’s not what I’m talking about.” We know he’s talking about his whole life. He says he wants to eat healthier the way the Japanese do. She snidely says he could stay in Japan and eat like that all the time. When he asks about the children, she again is on the offensive, saying they are getting used to not having their father around. After they hang up Bob sinks below the water, symbolically showing his marriage is also in jeopardy of going under water.

In the bar, the lounge singer sits next to Bob, smiles at him and says “Hi.” The next scene is Bob in bed and the singer is in his room, showing that they spent the night together. Bob does not look happy about what he has done, implying it was not the answer to his feeling of loneliness. Charlotte surprises Bob at his door asking if he wants to go to a restaurant. She hears the woman singing to herself in the background, and this discovery leads to Bob and Charlotte’s first “accident,” as Bob would say, on their relationship road. At the restaurant they are both sullen. She is sarcastic when she says it makes sense that he slept with the singer since, “she is closer” in age to him (than Charlotte, is the implication). She is jealous, and says, “Maybe she liked the movies you were making in the ‘70’s, when you were still making movies.” Her comment takes a shot at how old he is and suggests that he is a has-been. He retaliates by suggesting she is showing immature narcissism when he says, “Wasn’t there anyone else there to lavish you with attention?” Charlotte’s feeling “lost” is signified by her not being able to tell the difference between the offerings on the menu. Their very brief estrangement is seen in the fact that they are now silent.

A fire alarm wakes them up and while waiting outside Bob’s comic stance as he wears his kimono brings a smile to Charlotte’s face. They again bond as they criticize having to cook their own food at the restaurant. He’s leaving the next day and she says that she will miss him. At the bar, he admits he doesn’t want to leave. She says, “So don’t. Stay here with me. We’ll start a jazz band.” They are revealing their feelings for each other more openly now. The “jazz band” reference could show how they are in rebellion against what is around them, including the mediocre music that has been playing in the bar. They exchange a slightly off the lips kiss goodnight.

Charlotte says goodbye to him in the lobby unable to show a public display of affection despite Bob’s extended longing stare at her since there are a bunch of local people present who were attached to Bob’s visit. As he is driven away, he sees Charlotte walking in the street. He stops the car, and they share an extended hug and a long kiss. He whispers to her, and she says, “Okay.” There has been debate about what he says. But that isn’t the point. It is between them, a final act of connection in a disconnected world. The last shots are from the inside of the car, and we get Bob’s perspective as he now wishes he didn’t have to leave a city he first didn’t want to visit.

The next film is The Big Lebowski.

Groundhog Day

SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed.

Yes, this is a crazy comedy. But due to screenwriter/director, Harold Ramis, and the performance of Bill Murray, Groundhog Day (1993) successfully combines humor with an insightful exploration of various facets of human nature.

The film begins with a sky that is getting cloudy, as will the fate of the protagonist. The opening song says, “seasons come, and seasons go,” stressing change. The weatherman is the person who tries to help others to prepare for the fluctuations in the climate by foreseeing them. Phil Connors (Murray, who should have received an Oscar nomination for this role), however, is a self-absorbed Pittsburgh TV weather forecaster, who is egotistical about his ability to predict what’s going to happen, which makes him feel superior to others. His forecast on this day is snow which will miss the city and hit Altoona instead. He is smug in his condescension toward fellow workers. He calls the local news anchorwoman “Hairdo,” and says a major network is interested in him. Cameraman Larry (Chris Elliott) shoots back that it’s probably the Home Shopping Network. So Phil’s arrogance provokes dislike. He believes he is the “talent,” which he calls himself, and it’s a waste for him to attend the annual Groundhog Day festival on February 2nd in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. He is snobby about the rural local citizens, whom he later calls “morons,” who celebrate the silly idea that an animal, with the same name as Phil, which galls him, is equal to Phil’s ability to know if the rest of the winter will be cold by whether or not the critter sees his shadow. 

Along with Larry traveling in the TV station van is new producer Rita (Andie MacDowell). She wants to stay a bit longer after the ceremony in Punxsutawney because she thinks it’s a great human-interest story. She has affection for small town life. Phil ominously says this time will be his last doing this gig, and is concerned that someone might see him at the festival and think he has “no future.” How right he turns out to be, at least through a large part of his journey, if measured by his selfish view of what constitutes success. 

The town is an old-fashioned American community whose citizens have simple, wholesome tastes, as can be seen as the van passes a local movie theater showing a Heidi movie. Larry calls Phil a “prima donna” since he won’t stay at the hotel he labels “a fleabag.” Rita, anticipating his reaction, booked him in a bed and breakfast. Phil wakes up the next day as the clock-radio plays Sonny and Cher singing “I Got You Babe” at six in the morning, the first of innumerable times he will hear that song. The local broadcasters joke about the cold weather, and how the words on everybody’s “chapped lips,” because they are not in “Miami Beach,” are that it is Groundhog Day. 

Phil’s’ misanthropic attitude is in high gear. He is sarcastic to a man who is cheery anticipating what the groundhog will predict about the length of the winter. Phil says with a snobby attitude that he thinks it will end on March 21. After asking the hostess, Mrs. Lancaster (Angela Paton), for some specialty coffee and getting no definitive response, he snidely questions under his breath whether the bed and breakfast hostess can spell, “espresso,” or “cappuccino.” In response to whether he will be checking out that day, he uses his weatherman terminology and says, “Chance of departure today, 100 percent.” The man who is so sure of himself turns out to be 100 percent wrong.

The first time he passes by an old panhandler, he fakes looking for something in his pockets to give the man as he walks past. It is a token act of false concern. He meets an annoying but good-natured insurance salesman, Ned Ryerson (Stephen Tobolowsky) who knew Phil in high school. Of course the self-centered Phil admits that there’s “not a chance” that he recalls this fellow. Ned tries to jar Phil’s memory by saying he “did the whistling belly button trick at the talent show.” Phil pretends he remembers him and comes up with one of my favorite lines when he asks Ned, “Did you turn pro with that belly button thing?” Ned may be goofy, but he insightfully says he doesn’t understand fellow workers who rely on actuarial charts to predict people’s lives, and he adds that life is all a “crapshoot.” One of the themes of this story is that wanting to know the future and having control over it is a form of hubris, and not something to desire if that knowledge is used only for one’s own purposes. But, the film also stresses that one should learn and evolve through experience before moving forward. To stress this point, Phil now steps into an icy, wet hole in the street, the first of numerous occasions he makes this same mistake which symbolizes it takes him quite a while before he learns from his prior mistakes.

Phil goes to Gobbler's Knob for the Groundhog Day event with the Pennsylvania Polka playing in the background, which adds to the small town’s atmosphere. Rita loves the people there, who stayed up the previous night, sang songs, and are continuing the fun the next day. But, Phil has no appreciation for this country charm, calling the locals, “hicks.” He also is crude and offends Rita, saying she probably didn’t sleep well without him. The person running the show is Buster (Brian Doyle-Murray, Bill’s brother), and he says groundhog Phil saw his shadow and the bad news is there is not going to be an early spring. Phil wraps up the recording by saying TV can’t capture the excitement of a “large squirrel” predicting the weather. He walks off even though Rita wants him to do it again “without the sarcasm,” which at this point would require brain surgery to remove.

On the way out of town, the blizzard, that Phil said was supposed to miss this part of the state, closes the roads, and they can’t leave. Phil can’t accept that his prediction is wrong. When the state trooper asks him if he listened to the forecast, he says, “I make the weather.” His ego is so large that he depicts himself as someone with enough power to control nature. Rita and Larry try to make the best of the situation, and ask Phil if he wants to go to the Groundhog Day dinner, but Phil sarcastically says he had “groundhog for lunch,” again showing his hostility for the animal and the town that celebrates him. He just wants to go back to his room and read the sex magazine, Hustler, which elicits a sharp, “Suit yourself,” from the annoyed Rita. Phil doesn’t seem to care if he offends anyone.

The next day turns out to be the same day, as the clock radio again plays, “I’ve Got you, Babe,” and the disc jockeys are doing the same routine. (Ramis and co-writer Danny Rubin could have chosen any tune, but they picked a light-hearted one about the love between two people that can survive anything, which, although a simple theme, is what Phil must learn). Phil at first thinks they are playing yesterday’s tape. But there is no snow on the ground, and the town is celebrating Groundhog Day again. Phil will go through different stages as the same scenario repeats itself. He starts out with denial, confusion and then anger. When Mrs. Lancaster asks if he will be leaving that day, Phil is already starting to lose self-assuredness by saying the chances of departure are “75 to 80” percent. When told that everyone is going to celebrate Groundhog Day, he humorously, but with worry, says, “It’s still just once a year, isn’t it?” When he encounters Ned the second time (or, for the first time again), Ned guesses that Phil doesn’t have any insurance. His line stresses how Phil is the kind of person who thinks he doesn’t need anything to fall back on because he has it all figured out. His journey is meant to humble him and teach Phil that he is not the center of the universe.

When he gets to Gobbler’s Knob he admits, possibly for the first time in his life, that he “may be having a problem.” He knows what Rita is about to say, and now that predictability which comes from repetition and denies change or variety is frightening to him. On the third time he skips the broadcast and meets with Rita in the local diner. He tells her how he is reliving the same day, and she, of course, can’t figure out what his angle is to say something so crazy. Larry arrives and says what he will repeat innumerable times, “We better go, to stay ahead of the weather.” It’s something that Phil thought he could do, but he no longer has that ability.

Director Ramis plays the local neurologist that Phil visits. His physical examination is normal, and the specialist says he has to go to Pittsburgh for a CT scan or MRI. Of course, Phil confuses the doctor when he says he can’t go to the city because of the yet nonexistent blizzard. The irony here is that before, people would rely on Phil’s educated guesses about the approaching weather, but now his absolutely correct forecast is not believed, which alienates and unsettles Phil, preparing him for a change is his outlook on life. The neurologist suggests Phil see a psychiatrist (David Pasquesi). The shrink says they should meet again “tomorrow,” which won't allow the shrink to be of any help since nothing will carry forward. The next day will just be a reset with no cumulative knowledge except on the part of Phil, who must realize he must take advantage of what he learns about himself.

Instead of just going back to his room, Phil goes to the bowling alley and drinks beer with two blue-collar townspeople, Gus (Rick Ducommon) and Ralph (Rick Overton). Phil recalls a day in the Virgin Islands where he ate lobster, drank pina coladas, and made love to a woman, and wonders why he couldn’t relive that day instead. But this cosmic intervention is meant to realign Phil’s attitude toward others which would not occur if his behavior wasn’t challenged. As one of the men says, Phil “is ‘a glass half-empty’ kind of guy,” which stresses Phil’s negativity if things don’t go according to his plans. Phil asks what would they do if “stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing you did mattered?’ The response from one of the men is, “That about sums it up for me.” The movie is a fantasy, but although people may not want to admit it, so many of them live repetitious, predictable real-life versions of Groundhog Day. (As the three leave, Ralph looks like he’s going to barf. Phil asks, “you want to throw up here or in the car?” My daughter and I love to repeat lines from this movie, and Ralph’s response that we love is, “I think … both.” We also like to say the follow-up line, after we’ve had a large meal, “Who else could go for some flapjacks?”). 

Phil does the driving since he isn’t drunk like the other two. He asks them the question that moves Phil onto the next step on his road to dealing with his situation. He wonders, “What if there were no tomorrow?” Gus’s response is “That would mean there’d be no consequences, no hangovers, we could do whatever we wanted!” This revelation leads Phil to feel liberated from any restrictions, such as those a parent might dictate such as, “Clean up your room! Stand up Straight!” He says, “I’m not going to live by their rules anymore!” His statement is attractive to that part of a person that wants to put individual freedom above all else without having to worry about effects on oneself or others. It allows one to throw morality out of the window. Phil drives the car into a large sign of the groundhog in an act of defiance of the predictable loop he is caught up in. In terms of his own selfishness, he has turned the half-empty glass into a half-full one. (Given the premise, the movie could have shown horrendous acts of immorality, but the film is a comedy, and the mood remains mostly light).

When he wakes up in bed, and not in jail, Phil celebrates this time around and what follows are a series of self-indulgences. He decks Ned with one punch and goes to the diner and eats a table full of desserts in front of the astonished Rita. He also smokes a cigarette now because he doesn’t have to worry about his health. When she calls him a man of “advancing years,” he comically responds that his “years aren’t advancing as much as you think.” Through repetition, he learns all about a woman he sees in the diner, Nancy (Marita Geraghty) and pretends they were high school roommates. He says he always loved her, and wants to marry her. His tactic persuades Nancy to have sex with him. But during their intimate encounter, he calls “Rita,” which reveals who he truly cares about. He has memorized down to the smallest detail the arrival of an armored car carrying money so he can steal a bag of cash while the guards are distracted by the diner waitress, Doris (Robin Duke). He uses the money to drive a Mercedes, dress up like a cowboy, and bring a woman who is dressed like a French maid to the movie. We know time has passed for him since he says he saw the Heidi movie “over a hundred times.” 

After apparently having satisfied his carnal appetites, which bring limited satisfaction, Phil seems to focus on Rita. Why her, besides her being physically attractive? Perhaps because she has so many admirable characteristics that he lacks, and that he sees in her what he wishes he could be. But, he doesn't understand what true romance feels like, so he goes through the motions of what he thinks it should be. He uses the same maneuvers on her he used on Nancy. He asks about her desires and her views on things, so over time he can learn enough about her in order to use his one day of opportunity to win her over by acting like they are compatible. She says she likes someone who is “humble,” but also “intelligent, supportive, funny,” among other attributes. Phil has very few of these qualities at this point although he states to Rita that he does. One important item she mentions is that her ideal man should play an “instrument,” which will be important later. There are a series of small alterations over time of the same scene at a bar where Phil acts like he loves Rita’s favorite drink, repeats her toast to “world peace,” and reads French poetry that she admires. At the end of one of numerous daily reprisals where Phil tries to get all the details right, Rita says, “It’s a perfect day. You couldn’t plan a day like this.” Phil says, “Well you can. It just takes an awful lot of work.” And that is the problem, because from Rita’s viewpoint she has found out by chance some wonderful things about someone she undervalued. But the truth is Phil is a phony, who adopted Rita’s preferences instead of really being genuinely invested in them so he can have a romantic conquest. 

Because he has only one day, he rushes her, and after kissing, she stops and wants to slow things down between them. When he pushes too much and sounds like he is making a list when he recites her dislike for fudge and white chocolate, she rightly accuses him of constructing a “setup.” He says he loves her, and he does, but he has had the time to get to know her, while she hasn’t had that experience with him. She smacks him for making her care about him, and says that he only loves himself, which isn’t completely accurate at this point, but how would she be able to know that from his behavior?

He continues to try to create the perfect day with Rita which becomes as predictable as the rest of the day he is reliving. The numerous rehearsals destroy spontaneity and become extremely forced, ending with multiple slaps to Phil’s face. The powers involved in Phil’s journey require him to learn, through failure, the sin of selfishness. Because of his personal unfulfillment, Phil then descends into a deep depression. He slowly and sadly repeats the words of the DJ’s, with his own alteration, saying, “it’s cold out there. It’s cold out there every day.” While watching an episode of “Jeopardy,” which he has memorized, he voices the answers even before the questions are finished, astonishing the others watching with him in a lobby. There is no thrill to getting the right answers if you already know them, because there is no excitement in the absence of a challenge. 

At one of his broadcasts Phil lashes out at the crowd for worshiping “a rat.” He calls the celebration “a hype.” But isn’t he the unlovable celebrity version of the groundhog who tries to predict what will happen? The tone in the movie has turned darker now as Phil offers his “winter prediction.” He says, “It’s going to be cold. It’s going to be grey. And it’s going to last you the rest of your life.” There are a series of shots of Phil destroying his clock radio as it plays at six am. Since time has become a punishment to him he wants it to stop. In another taping, he says the winter will never end, “as long as this groundhog keeps seeing his shadow,” thus extending the length of the season over and over. Phil steals the truck holding the groundhog in his carrier and kidnaps his namesake because he must put a stop to predictions. The local authorities along with Rita and Larry follow Phil to a quarry. Phil then pulls a Thelma and Louise with the groundhog as he plunges the truck off the ledge, smashing the vehicle onto the ground below. (Another couple of lines my daughter and I like to repeat when watching a car crash in a movie comes from Larry here when he says, “He might be okay,” followed by, “Well, no. Probably not,” after the truck bursts into flames). 

Killing himself and the groundhog doesn't stop the resets. Phil keeps trying to end his life, dropping a toaster in his bath, getting hit by a truck, and jumping off a building. There were many more attempts which he relates to Rita at breakfast at the diner as he tells her about his continually reliving Groundhog Day. He concludes that he is immortal, like a god. He talks about the lives of the patrons and can state when one of the waiters will drop a tray of dishes, because he has witnessed it countless times. He concludes that God may know everything just by being around long enough to gather all this information. But this shift to observational knowledge eventually allows Phil to step away from himself and become involved in the lives of others. The amazed Rita asks if he also knows about her. He has paid attention to details about her, and Phil for the first time is touching as he says that she, “likes boats but not the ocean. You go to a lake in the summer with your family up in the mountains. There’s a long wooden dock and a boathouse with boards missing from the roof, and a place you used to crawl underneath to be alone. You’re a sucker for French poetry and rhinestones. You’re very generous. You’re kind to strangers and children. And when you stand in the snow you look like an angel.” He says that Larry will walk in and he writes down what he will say about leaving “to stay ahead of the weather.” He begs her not to leave him, and, of course, Larry does exactly what Phil said.

Rita stays with Phil as they walk around Punxsutawney. He admits what he said has to be true because how else would he know so much since he’s “not that smart.” Humility has finally touched Phil’s soul. Rita says she would stay with him to be an objective observer, sort of like a “science project,” and Phil having Rita as a companion, not a conquest, allows him to enjoy life again for a day by hanging out with her. He sadly says that the “worst part is that tomorrow you’ll have forgotten all about this, and you’ll treat me like a jerk again.” He admits that is what he is, which shows how he has gained insight into himself. Rita gives him that “glass half full” twist, saying maybe it’s not a “curse” that has been visited upon him. She says, “It depends on how you look at it.” She hugs him and as she falls asleep in the middle of the night he whispers to her that he does not yet “deserve someone like you,” but promises that if he were ever worthy, he would love her for the rest of his life. What he says here contrasts with his early repetition of “Me” as being the right man for Rita. She stays with him, but she disappears at six in the morning. Phil has to reboot himself, which is what Groundhog Day has been offering him to do, to act on Rita’s optimistic take on his situation so he can be free.

In one of the subsequent Groundhog Days, Phil smiles as he approaches the umpteenth time he films the event. He brings breakfast to his work colleagues and suggests a better way to shoot the piece. He helps carry equipment and asks Larry about his life. He is no longer thinking only of himself and acts like a part of a team. He says at one of his tapings that “winter is just another step in the cycle of life.” He even says that being among the citizens of the town, he “couldn’t imagine a better fate than a long and lustrous winter.” He has come to embrace the cold season that he earlier despised because now he can see the bigger picture, and enjoy the emotional warmth of others.

Phil reads books to educate himself. He becomes artistic, and learns to ice sculpt. He takes piano lessons, not just because Rita wanted a man who plays an instrument, but because he uses the time granted to him as a blessing to improve himself. He greets the man at the bed and breakfast, whom he previously met with sarcasm, with joy and a poem that says winter holds the promise of spring. He is definitely making that lemonade out of the lemons. 

But he also becomes a sort of guardian angel. Phil gives all the money he has to the old beggar, and later helps him to the hospital when he sees him staggering at the end of the day. When the man passes away, and Phil realizes that Groundhog Day is the last day on earth for the man, he tries to make it better for him, making sure he has a nice meal, and even attempts to revive him when he collapses. He now knows he is not a god because he can’t change some things even if he knows how they will turn out. He helps Buster by using the Heimlich maneuver on him and helps a young woman, Debbie (Hynden Walch) get over her fear of marriage to Fred (Michael Shannon, in his film debut). He also catches a boy who falls from a tree (IMDb points out that the boy is in the hospital with a broken leg in the scene when Phil takes the old man there, so Phil later prevents the accident). He also helps change a tire for old ladies who get a flat. He buys every type of insurance offered from Ned, who says it's the best day of his life. In an astounding turnaround, Phil agrees, and says, “Mine, too.”

At the Groundhog Day dinner, which Phil now wants to attend, Rita finds out how popular Phil has become in one day since he has been very busy helping others as well as giving pleasure to those hearing him play the piano at the dinner. When she asks him what he did that day, Phil delivers one of the movie’s best lines, “Oh, same old, same old.” But he has really made that “same” into something new. She is amazed and “buys” him at an auction for charity. He makes an ice sculpture of her face, which Rita says is “lovely,” but she doesn’t know how he can make such a creation. After the passage of so much time (it has been suggested that ten years have passed), he says, “I know your face so well, I could do it with my eyes closed.” He knows how to live in the moment because, he says, that no matter what happens, he is “happy now.” He admits to loving her, and this time he is sincere. She says she is happy, too, and they kiss. As IMDb indicates, it begins to snow, which signals that there is a change coming, as it does in It’s a Wonderful Life, when George returns to the reality that includes him among the living. (And the same phenomenon occurs in another Christmas movie, The Family Man, when Nicholas Cage’s character will soon return to his real life).

The next morning turns out to really be the next morning. Even though the same song plays, the DJ’s are saying something different, and Rita’s hand comes into the shot as she turns off the radio. Phil says, “something is different,” and when she asks if that is good, he says, “Anything different is good,” as predictability is no longer needed. There is snow on the ground, so the blizzard has left its mark, and it no longer is Groundhog Day. She stayed because he asked her to, and they just fell asleep. He says it “was the end of a very long day. Is there anything I can do for you today?” His first desire now is to please another, not himself. He can now go forward to spread the benevolence he has learned so it will embrace others.

When they go outside, Phil looks at the white covering of snow, a hallmark of the season he originally despised, and says, “It’s so beautiful!” He now is so grateful for what being in the town has taught him that he says, “Let’s live here!” But he says they’ll just rent to start. Afterall, it has been a spooky place for him. The song at the end of the film (from the musical Brigadoon which appropriately plays here, because it is about a place caught in time) has the lyrics, “What a day this has been/What a rare mood I’m in/Why it’s almost like being in love/There’s a smile on my face/for the whole human race.” In the end, when true love is shared, people can be happy together anywhere. That feels like deja vu. Didn't I just say that?

The next film is Do the Right Thing.