Groundhog Day Open Thread

 

Let's do this day just once, though.

Comments

[nancy]

20th anniversary live-blogging of the movie tonight at 8 PM EST. Not sure how this will work, but you multi-taskers might be interested.

I'm embarrassed to say how many times I must have seen this movie.

[nancy]

An interview from today's Seattle Times in which 'Ned Reyerson' discusses how the director and writer made last minute script changes, giving us the movie we love today.

One particular change, Tobolowsky remembered, really set the tone for the movie. Originally, Ramis shot “a gigantic scene that took three days ... where Bill shaves his head into a mohawk, takes spray paint and paints graffiti all over the inside of his room, then he takes a chain saw and starts sawing the room in half.” It was an expensive scene, and Ramis, after consideration, quickly cut it. He replaced it with a much quieter, simpler moment: Murray, going to bed terrified, breaks a pencil in half and puts it on his radio. When he wakes up, the pencil is whole. The first time he watched the movie in a theater, Tobolowsky said, the audience gasped at that moment. “We expect a crazy Bill Murray movie ... and [Ramis] replaced it with visual poetry.”

[low-tech cyclist]

nancy - I'm not sure how many times I've watched Groundhog Day - I'm certainly into double digits, plus watching assorted excerpts on YouTube.

I had no idea that yesterday was the 20th anniversary of the movie's release. That's kinda cool. And that was gutsy of Ramis to scrap that scene and go in the direction he actually took the movie.

It's definitely in my top 50 movies.

[oddjob]

I'm embarrassed to say how many times I must have seen this movie.

I'm your opposite. I've never seen anything of it but brief snippets. (Recently I sat down to watch it on one of my cable channels, but switched then changed channels during the opening credits.)

[oddjob]

(Argghhhh..... That first line was supposed to be in italics.

I think the Groundhog Day theme makes it difficult for me to watch. I find that particular bit of folklore really irritating rather than charming.)

[oddjob]

(Now that I think about it, I'm also not sure I've watched any Bill Murray movie to completion.)

[Foanvg]

fess up and run the risk of having that person come see the lag in submissions and conclude essay writing we are not dedicated

[nancy]

Kinda late add-on, but...I liked this assessment of the movie and its import a lot. From the Partially Examined Life : " 'Groundhog Day' as Platonic Morality Tale."

Oddjob, I have to believe you'd find it appealing. Groundhog Day is merely the occasion for the news crews' assignment. Bill Murray is *the talent* getting lessons one wishes all of our self-important and over-rated talent would get.