Over the last three decades many people have become fans of the 1993 film “Groundhog Day”. On one level it is yet another “single day time-loop” movie — a concept that had already been explored in the 1990 short film “12:01 P.M.” and even before that in the 1947 short film “La vie r\u00e9volt\u00e9e”.<\/p>\n
But in my mind there is one key plot point that makes watching “Groundhog Day” a uniquely profound experience.<\/p>\n
As the same day continues to repeat, the main character of Phil (played brilliantly by Bill Murray) gradually comes to see himself as a sort of minor god. The better he gets to know the intricacies of the day, the more he is able to influence the course of that day.<\/p>\n
However, he hits a wall when trying to save the life of an old man (played by the veteran actor Les Podewell). No matter what he does, he cannot succeed in preventing the old man from dying on that day.<\/p>\n
To me, this is the only aspect of the film that truly speaks to the larger nature of Phil’s metaphysical journey. Yes, Phil has indeed become a kind of minor god, but we learn here that behind the scenes there are larger forces at work.<\/p>\n
The old man dies because it is his time. Phil can affect many things, but he cannot defeat mortality itself. But why?<\/p>\n
Because that is not the way the Universe works. In my mind, that revelation elevates the film from an amusing metaphysical comedy to a profound meditation on the human condition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Over the last three decades many people have become fans of the 1993 film “Groundhog Day”. On one level it is yet another “single day time-loop” movie — a concept that had already been explored in the 1990 short film “12:01 P.M.” and even before that in the 1947 short film “La vie r\u00e9volt\u00e9e”. But … Continue reading “What makes “Groundhog Day” profound”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28512"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28512"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28512\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28513,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28512\/revisions\/28513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}