The film Groundhog Day is about cynical weatherman Phil Connors who travels to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania to report on the holiday that is Groundhog Day. The audience is quickly turned off to the character with his pessimistic mindset and rather rude approach to those around him. However when the next day rolls around, Phil is awakened to the same alarm clock radio stating that it once again is February 2nd… Groundhog Day. How could this be? Phil finds himself asking this question with denial, and then acceptance that he is in a way “immortal”. He then fills his following days chasing after his coworker, Rita, by finding out bits and pieces about her to scam her into falling in love with him. Even with all of his advances, she still sees his motives as unfaithful. With this Phil begins to loose his mind and attempts different forms of suicide in effort to escape this repetitive hell. Eventually, Phill begins to realize the kind of person that he is. How his snide comments, intense ego, and total disregard to those around him truly affects others lives. Is this the reason he’s stuck in a repetitive day? To do the right thing? He uses the learned ways of the loop to save those around him both physically and mentally and ultimately becomes a better person. He ends up falling in love with Rita with true intentions and states that even if he wakes up alone again the next morning, he would be content. But when he awakens the same radio music plays, but something is different… The radio speech is not the same and it is finally February 3rd. This has always been one of my favorite movies because it uses a fictional story to tell of how someone can find themselves and change their persona for the better. I never thought I would apply this to my own life until my loop started in the second week of March, 2020.
When the Covid-19 Pandemic first broke out, people everywhere were basically told to stop their lives and reside in their homes condemned to their own loop. I personally was living the same day over and over again for about 2 months until restrictions began to ease in my state. I think that this film can be instructive to this year of the plague because although it feels like a curse, it is also a gift. Like Phil, we are all gifted more time to be home with our families or more time to learn new hobbies that normally we wouldn’t have learned. Taking these extra minutes to learn more about ourselves or practice “mindfulness” as discussed in Jeremy Engels reflection of the film, could truly give us the opportunity to embrace our own “Groundhog Day”. Being a better person isn’t just about being nice to others, but also paying attention to yourself and your own everyday endeavors. Yes, 2020/2021 has been the worst time of most of our lives, but if we use the same motto and mentality of this 1993 film, then we too can improve ourselves for the better.
