Ah... those good old days...

I happened to see one of my all-time favorite movies - Groundhog Day. It is one of the funniest movies I have come across. The story-line is simple - A weatherman goes to a small local town, Punxatawney, in Pennysylvania on the eve of Groundhog day. For the first-timers, Groundhog day, observed on Febraury 2, is the day when a rat-like species comes out of its burrow and checks for its shadow. It is believed that the winter would last for 6 more weeks if the shadow appears... otherwise, an early spring. Well, the movie shows this event but that is not the main theme.

Our protagonist, being a weatherman, goes to cover this event along with his cameraman and producer. It is just another day for him and he sails through it. Little does he realise that he had to do it umpteen number of times, for he experiences the same day over and over and over.... An innovative plot, albeit implausible, but what makes the movie such a treat to watch is the script. The protagonist's reaction to the situation is crazy at the start, then hopelessly negative before he starts seeing the positive side of it. Bill Murray, as the lead actor, does an excellent job here displaying the transition.

He laments, in one of the scenes, why this repeating day could not be the day he really enjoyed in the past with his girlfriend. That brought me the thought: We too have had many moments in our past which we still feel nostalgic about. Like the school/college days, the days we roamed with friends, the days we felt the sense of achievement, the days of romance et al. The question is: Will we be ready to get into the time-warp to such an interesting moment. And after going through those moments twice or thrice, would we still find it interesting and wish to stay right there. I guess not. We may like reliving it another time but that is it. I think one of the reasons why we still find those moments interesting is because of the fact that they never recur.