The Groundhog Day film starring Bill Murray is my most inspiring film of all time. Not only is it funny but for me it carries a brilliant message about life. My interpretation goes something like this.
A TV anchor man who has a serious ego problem is sent on a job he hates. He has to cover the annual weather predicting groundhog celebrations in some freezing town in the middle of nowhere. He does the job resentfully and badly and finds himself having to live that same dreadful day over and over. He tries all sorts of things to escape having to repeat the day but nothing works. He then resorts to greedily exploiting the situation in various comical ways but he is still unhappy. He becomes depressed and tries suicide but still wakes up having to repeat this same day.
Eventually he decides to make the best of where he finds himself and actually starts learning. Learning new skills, but also learning about himself and learning to be helpful to others. He also starts to do a much better job at reporting on the event and he really starts to enjoy the day. Each time he relives the day he tries to do a better job than the day before and amazing things start to happen. He goes from hating the town to loving the town. All the people start to love him and his life becomes blissful.
So for me the film is about life. Our response to situations and people gives us the opportunity for happiness and fulfilment. When we resist the situation the pain continues but when we accept it, embrace, enjoy or even love the situation we can find inner happiness. And as I said the film is very funny. It’s best viewed about 12 times. It was recently screened in Liverpool on a 24 hour loop, sadly, I missed it but I may go next year.
