Selfish and snarky, Bill Murray’s Phil Connors is a Pittsburgh weatherman who plans to be in Punxsutawney, Pa., for just one day: Feb. 2, Groundhog Day. Except that the day repeats itself, with infinitely minute variations, until Phil gets it right. In a minor scandal, the film got no nominations. An Oscar should have gone to Harold Ramis and Danny Rubin for the script, which deftly balances comedy and philosophy (is God a groundhog? Discuss), and another to Bill Murray for acting. From Caddyshack to What About Bob?, Murray had refined his amiable doofus into the minimalist modern man: his posture a question mark, his face a concrete poem of anticipated disappointment. In Groundhog Day he rises to romance and sinks to despair — and is wonderfully funny — all in the same day after day after day.
