The Verdict: Is Groundhog Day A Time Travel Movie?
The Verdict: Is Groundhog Day A Time Travel Movie?
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Welcome to WatchMojo’s The Verdict, the series where we tackle the biggest debates in pop culture and put them to rest. Today, we'll be deciding once and for all... is Groundhog Day a time travel movie? Remember, like any high profile court case, there are strong arguments to be made on both sides. If you disagree with our verdict, be sure to state your case in the comments below. Let's dive in! Oh, but first… a spoiler warning is in effect! This should seem simple, right? A ""time travel movie"" involves... time travel. But when you put that term under the microscope and start pulling at the strings, the definition unravels into a much more nebulous concept—one with which ""Groundhog Day"" has a rather complicated relationship.
Just the Facts
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The vast majority of popular cinema is narrative-driven. But there’s more than one way to tell a story. Many films play fast and loose with time and chronology without making their narrative explicitly centered on time travel. “Memento” is a nonlinear head trip that will have you more twisted up than 90% of time travel movies. “The Fountain"" and ""Cloud Atlas"" both take us on complex journeys through time—and yet neither can rightfully be called ""time travel movies"". Where do you draw the line? And where does “Groundhog Day” fall? In order to answer this question, we’ll be taking a closer look at the unifying features and characteristics that time travel movies overwhelmingly share in common.
Do the Twist
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Time travel is a plot device, not a genre in and of itself. Whether it’s used in a thriller, comedy or action film, there's often some shocking twist that implicates the protagonist (or another character) in unexpected ways. The ending of “12 Monkeys” is a great example: James Cole’s traumatic childhood experience takes on a whole new significance. “Predestination”, starring Ethan Hawke, is a more recent example with a delightfully complex twist. “Arrival” is one of those gray area films — is it about time travel or the perception of time? Regardless, like many time travel movies, it brings things full circle in ways that wouldn’t be possible without a character being displaced in time. But what about our buddy Phil? Given that he’s reliving February 2nd over and over again,“Groundhog Day” is all about predictability. This proves to be surprisingly fertile ground for Bill Murray’s comedic style, but no major plot twists. Instead, the film uses repetition to serve up a revelation of a more personal variety when Phil’s imprisonment in Punxsutawney invites self-discovery. Fun fact: the film’s original draft did actually include a massive twist, in which we learn Rita is stuck living the next day over and over again.
Tell Us How It Works, Doc!
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Time travel movies almost always involve a mechanism of some sort. Most commonly, time travel is made possible by some sort of time machine or a “time master”. The latter is any individual with the ability to move themselves or others through time. As for the time machine, it can be any device (magical, mechanical or even a force of nature like a black hole) that makes time travel possible. Most time travel films have certain rules, which are often tied to their mechanism of choice. Assuming “A Christmas Carol” isn't one big dream, even Charles Dickens provided a mechanism in the form of the ghosts. No one ever does a big exposition dump in “Groundhog Day”, however, nor does Phil ever discover why this is happening to him. There are rules and Phil tests them in a variety of ways, but they don’t yield any answers apart from… you’re stuck! If “Groundhog Day” is a time travel movie, it's more interested in the journey than the science.
Seeing Double
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Speaking of rules, most time travel movies agree that you should not interact with your past self. The implications vary from one movie to the next, but it’s almost always bad. Seeing a doppelganger could drive you mad or even destroy you, because… physics! Then again, if the time travel movie subscribes to a “closed loop” theory—in which everything has and always will play out the same—an assist from your past self may be an unavoidable part of the equation. Thankfully for Phil, he’s the only Phil in Punxsutawney on February 2nd (well, other than the Groundhog, of course). And let’s be honest, this town isn’t big enough for two of him! Rather than travelling from the future to the past and encountering his past self, Phil simply wakes up again the same morning, in the same physical state as before - but remembering already having done so. We get that the time anomaly that Phil is experiencing is a uniquely frustrating one but hey… at least he doesn’t have to worry about paradox psychosis!
The High Stakes of Time Travel
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When you mess with time, bad things can happen. Just ask Marty McFly! One false move and you can rewrite history—or give your nemesis the tools to get filthy rich. You might be a nobody back home, but when you time travel, lives hang in the balance. Time travel movies almost always involve an element of trying to rewrite the past or avoid messing it up. In “Terminator,” changing the past is the machine mandate, and yet it’s this time traveling arms race that actually leads to the birth of John Connor. The reality is, even a small change can have massive consequences. Seriously, how many times did Ashton Kutcher’s character get it wrong in “The Butterfly Effect?” In Phil’s case, however, the repetition makes him feel as if his actions have NO consequences. And so he initially shows a complete disregard for the happiness and wellbeing of both himself and others. He explicitly puts himself in mortal danger to test the limits. In many ways, “Groundhog Day” flies in the face of time-honored time travel themes by making Phil want nothing to do with this break in space-time. He doesn’t desire to bring about change or preserve anything. He doesn't have any explicit purpose. Or so he thinks…
The Wildcard Factor
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While there's no authority to tell him what's going on, Phil does wind up finding meaning in his experience. This isn’t a film about righting past wrongs, saving the future or establishing equilibrium in the time stream. But despite his initial resistance, Phil's experience living the same day over and over again IS a journey of personal growth. While time travel plots are inherently convoluted, they most often follow fairly conventional narrative arcs. By contrast, “Groundhog Day” is a deceptively simple but fascinating exercise in storytelling because it goes against how stories are typically told. Rather than the boredom one might expect, the writers were able to find meaning in the repetition.
The Verdict
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The evidence has been presented, and we are ready to render our verdict: “Groundhog Day” is NOT a time travel movie; it's a time loop movie. And while one could argue that this is just a sub-type of the time travel genre, it's clearly cut from a very different cloth. The narrative structure of a time loop movie is such that it actually eschews all the usual characteristics of a time travel movie in favor of one unifying principle - getting OUT of the time loop. “Groundhog Day” isn’t a time travel movie, but it’s arguably more important as a result. It’s been interpreted as everything from a spiritual guidebook to an analogy about military service and a lesson in economics. Though “Groundhog Day” was not the first time loop film, it popularized the mechanic, giving birth to numerous imitators. From the concept of having the character’s repetition cued by a certain song, to the now classic montage of time loop debauchery, the film’s influence reverberates throughout pop culture—and does it on its own terms. "
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