In recycled daze

If you haven’t seen the 1993 comedy Groundhog Day, don’t miss a chance to catch up on it sometime. It’s actually an exceptional work of moral fiction about a selfcentred and arrogant TV weather forecaster who has to spend an extra day at a small town because of a snowstorm. The man hates it but there’s no alternative but to leave the next day when the skies clear. However, when he wakes the next morning, it’s the morning of the day before all over again with no one else apparently aware of the time loop besides him. Then the same thing happens the morning after that too and pretty soon he’s trapped in aseemingly endless cycle, forced to repeat the same day over and over again.

At first, he responds with bewilderment. Then he uses the repetitious cycle to his advantage — even learning to play the piano and to speak French in an effort to seduce his producer. Finally he spirals into despondency, trying to take his life, gorging on food, shamelessly accosting women on the street. After all how does it matter? In the morning no one will remember and he’ll have to begin all over once more. If he does nothing different, events will repeat themselves as they were on the original day. Groundhog Day has even been dubbed by some religious leaders as the “most spiritual film of our time”. That’s because it’s only when, an endless number of days later, our hero learns humility, understanding and acceptance of his fate that he breaks the cycle and finally wakes to a new morning. If you have seen it, see it again.