Somewhere in the middle of “Groundhog Day,” Bill Murray turns to the man sitting beside him at a bar and says in a voice of despair, “What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was the same and nothing mattered?”
This is the philosophy of life that the rather obnoxious and egocentric weatherman has brought to this delicious time-warp fantasy. Murray has gotten stuck, truly stuck, in Punxsutawney, Pa., where he went to cover the Feb. 2 festivities.
For this weatherman, there is literally no tomorrow. Or, to be more precise, tomorrow is another today. He wakes up the next morning to the same morning, and he’s the only one who knows it. Moreover, he is doomed to relive the day until he gets it right.
To the jaded moviegoer, “Groundhog Day” may well be to Feb. 2 what “It’s a Wonderful Life” is to Dec. 25. It presents the possibility of human renewal-only with a sense of humor.
To the jaded female, it also presents the possibility that even a self-centered cad can eventually get it. Given time enough, Andie MacDowell, and a dozen slaps to the face, any man is educable.
But sitting in my popcorn perch, I’m willing to bet that the appeal of this hit movie comes less from the fantasy it evokes than from its echoes of real life. Especially real life at midlife.
What would you do if you woke up in the same place and every day was the same?
For most people, middle age is a little bit like that. It’s long past the time of life when most of us were building our careers, beginning our families, and nesting. It’s the maintenance stage when an extraordinary amount of energy is going to upkeep-keeping up the commitments you have. One morning inevitably looks a lot like the one before it.
The daydreams of youth that Hollywood usually respects are about breaking away. The daydreams of middle age that get screenplays are most often centered on starting over.
Books also tend to divide the adult life cycle into dramatic passages. We are regaled with theories that show us facing a dead end, following an exit sign out of the old rut and choosing a new beginning.
But in real life, those of us who do not want to start over in the middle face a very different test of renewal. Daily renewal. Getting up in the same place, doing the same things-only making it matter.
Most of us don’t want to throw everything over and go to live in Tahiti with the tennis pro. We don’t want to have a post-menopausal baby or a second career in brain surgery. So we have to figure out how to make the best of what we have.
Making the best of what we have, I might add, is not second best. It’s not the siren call of a midlife depression inviting us to settle. It is, rather, a demand for active engagement in caring for what and whom we value.
That is what’s touching about “Groundhog Day.” Our trapped weatherman has to learn this the hard way. His life is reduced to one inescapable day. He finally comes to the not-so-profound-but-still-pretty-rare realization that he can change his world by changing himself.
As a prescription for midlife when the outlines of our lives are pretty clear, this movie’s about making the best of what you have . . . over and over. Making small repairs and improvements so that the commitments of midlife-the work you do and people you love-don’t become a trap. They become and remain the town in which you choose to live even when you have options.
If that sounds hopelessly sappy, well, blame it on the movies. But after watching Murray, I will never tell you to have a nice day. How about making a few, nicer, days?
