Rating: 
Summary: DVD PRODUCT ERROR - NOT IN DTS SOUND!
Review: I am not sure what the oversight is, but beware! This DVD does NOT come with a DTS (Digital Theatre Sound)Soundtrack as advertized on the package and still by Amazon. It comes with a Dolby Digital 5.1 Soundtrack (among other DD 2.0 foreign language tracks)Although I LOVE this film, I had already bought the original DVD, and shelled out the money for this one just to have it in DTS sound. I was very disappointed and now have to go to all the trouble of returning it. So, for those of you who enjoy DTS, you are apparently out of luck. If anyone knows of any reparations being made by Colombia / TriStar, please E-mail me!
Rating: 
Summary: The perfect Bill Murray movie
Review: Early on in this movie about a man stuck living the same day over and over we hear him complain about the monotony of his situation to a barfly who says it sounds like his life.This movie is about finding out what to do when you're stuck in a rut. Watch it for the right-on-target humor of the situation, or for the heartfelt romance, or even for the way the filmmaking process is reflected in the mind-numbing repetitions in his life (moviemaking is about multiple takes, right?). In the end the movie is a terrific story of a man who finds his reasons to keep going on and discovering to his amazement that the rest of his life falls into place. Somehow he stays the same guy but becomes much better at the same time. This version has a comment track I haven't heard and a documentary I'd like to see. Since I already have my Groundhog Day DVD I'll be renting it for those features and grumbling that they weren't available when I bought.
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful Movie, Disappointing 'Special Edition'...
Review: "Groundhog Day" is a movie that's aged really well in the past nine years, and I think will be looked back on as a classic comedy in a few decades. Using a relatively simple plot device (Bill Murray's arrogant, pesudocosmpolitan character living the same day over and over in a small Midwestern town), Harold Ramis created a silly, sweet, touching romantic comedy that is endlessly rewatchable. That said, though, I would've expected a great deal more from a 'Special Edition' of such a well-loved movie. The main differences between this release and the original DVD release of a few years ago are the addition of a commentary track by Harold Ramis and a half-hour or so behind-the-scenes documentary. The menus are also now animated and there are a few filmographies and trailers for other movies added, but these hardly help with the "Special Edition" status the disc is given. The commentary track gives some interesting info on the movie, but Ramis spends a lot of time talking about the background actors and eventually wears a bit thin on the anecdotes. If they could have gotten Bill Murray or Chris Elliott (or even Stephen Tobolowsky) to do the commentary track with him, it would've covered over a lot of the silences and helped with the narrative style, which Ramis keeps very light. Nonetheless, Ramis's fondness for the movie comes out quite cleary, and he's still fun to listen to. The documentary falls a bit flat in that in covers much of the same ground as the commentary track. Save the few behind-the-scenes photos and outtakes, there's little there that Ramis doesn't discuss in his commentary. Even more disappointing is that both refer to scenes that were shot and not used that do not appear in a 'Deleted Scenes' section. If you liked the movie, but haven't picked the DVD up yet, I recommend getting this version over the original release. If you already own the original DVD, though, there's little reason to pick this one up unless you're a huge fan of the movie. I, for one, hope they eventually release a true 'Special Edition' with deleted scenes, press materials, the script (both Danny Rubin's original and with Ramis's revisions) and everything else we've come to expect from truly first-rate 'Special Editions' - which this one sadly isn't.
Rating:
Summary: a classic hides in the shadows
Review: Okay, I'm going to have to ask you to bear with me past the opening line of this review : Groundhog Day is perhaps the most underappreciated
movie of the 90s and one of the best comedies since Hollywood's Golden Age, a film Frank Capra would have been proud of making. Did I
lose you? Rolling on the ground laughing? Does the very concept of Bill Murray and Harold Ramis making one of the great films of all time
strike you as too absurd for words? Well, hold on, and try this : forget everything you know about the movie and just listen to a brief
description : A monstrously self-centered TV personality is sent to small town America to cover a hokey holiday. He's accompanied by a
too-innocent-to-be-believed, but button-cute, producer and a smart-alecky camera man. Trapped by a snow storm, which he had erroneously
predicted would miss the region, our egomaniac is forced to spend the night in town and, when he awakes, finds to his horror that he's reliving
the same day over again. And reliving, and reliving, and reliving.... At first, he takes some enjoyment in the seeming prescience this provides
him and he takes great liberties once he realizes that he will never have to face the consequences for any action he takes, because tomorrow
never comes. Though his producer is quite obviously repelled by his self-centered nature, he eventually discovers that he can worm his way
into her affections by dating her over and over again and discovering her likes and dislikes, since she, of course, remembers nothing of the
prior dates. Yet, even with all this effort, he is unable to win her, because he remains, fundamentally, obnoxious. Forced to confront his own
unpleasantness and unlovability and the essential emptiness of his life, the man, aware now that he hates himself, tries to commit suicide, in
various and sundry ways, but always awakens to greet the dawning of the new/old day. And so now, at last, his efforts turn to
self-improvement, rather than to self-aggrandizement, and to helping others rather than to satisfying his own urges. His dilemma forces him to
move beyond himself and to serve others. Where he once avoided the people of the town like the plague, he is now become an integral part of
their community, and where he once saw the producer as merely an object of his lust, he now proves himself worthy of her love. The next
morning, time resumes its regular progression and he resumes his life, a better man. Honestly, doesn't that sound like a Capra flick, starring
Jimmy Stewart and Jean Arthur? In fact, Bill Murray and Harold Ramis have made enough dogs, separately and together, to warrant your healthy skepticism, but Murray's
performance here is generally under control and Ramis seldom stoops to gags and pratfalls. There's a big upside to the nasty edge that Murray
always carries with him; we're prone to forgetting just how dark Jimmy Stewart's screen persona often tended to be, from explosive and
suicidal, like George Bailey in It's a Wonderful Life, to voyeuristic and manipulative, in Rear Window, to domineering and obsessive, in
Vertigo. Andie MacDowell, on the other hand, is a tad too vacuous to counterbalance Murray effectively, but that's a tolerable flaw since it's
very much Murray's movie. Still not convinced? Here's my last try : how many recent films, nevermind comedies, actually have a story arc where the main character,
instead of going through some process of healing his inner child, or whatever, improves himself by becoming a better member of society?
What's the last comedy you saw that both made you laugh and made you think? (Heck, how many do either?) If you think about it, this movie
runs counter to two of the worst trends in modern culture, the appalling focus on the self, and the annoying tendency to dumb art down so that
it can be marketed across societal and national borders without losing anything in the translation. Make a movie for the purposes of selling it
to teens and to China and you're going to have to go with scatology instead of metaphysics. Thus, it's increasingly rare to find a movie that
requires that your synapses actually be firing, much less one that causes them to fire more quickly. NBC has done something quite savvy and socially useful in recent years; they've turned It's a Wonderful Life into a Christmas-time event.
Sure it was great when local PBS stations played it incessantly and we all learned the script by heart, but there's something more appealing
about turning it into a shared viewing experience for the nation, one that hundreds of thousands of homes are tuned into at the same time.
We've so few rituals left that bind us together as a community that perhaps one of the best services the television networks can provide is to
establish a few holiday traditions, revolving around movies, or other specials, that they'd show yearly. Besides Wonderful Life and TNT's
Christmas Story marathon and ABC's showing of The Ten Commandments around Passover, someone could show Gettysburg on the 4th of
July; PBS could re-air Eyes on the Prize around Martin Luther King, Jr. Day; show Young Abraham Lincoln on President's Day; etc., etc.,
etc..... And show Groundhog Day you know when--it's a classic, let's treat it like one. No, seriously... GRADE : A
Rating:
Summary: WARNING: The Special Features are Lousy
Review: I?m totally obsessed with this movie; I must have seen it start-to-finish over 25 times. Boy, did I want to like this Collectors' Edition DVD, but sadly, I must announce that it's a let-down. I'm talking about this edition, not the film itself, which other reviewers have adequately discussed. One thing you should be warned about: the extra features that come with this DVD, such as the documentary, "The Weight of Time," and the "director's running commentary" option ... blow. The documentary was filmed just last year (2001), and many of the characters and crew don't seem to remember much about the movie, except in general terms. Bill Murray himself doesn't deign to make an appearance, even though it is frequently alleged that this film represents the best work of his now-defunct career. And this is NOT the "Making of Groundhog Day" documentary that ran on HBO when that network released the film; I have no idea where to get that well-made and amusing documentary, but be warned that THIS is not it. You weren't missing anything from the anamorphic thing. The anamorphic was not 1.35:1, but only 1.85:1, meaning that if you've been watching this on a normal TV and VCR combination, you haven't been missing much. It's not the revelatory experience some DVD's are. Another thing that annoyed me to no end: many of the scenes that were not included in the final cut of the movie do not find their way onto this Collectors' Edition DVD as deleted scenes. Why not? Their existence is certain: you can hear Harold Ramis mention several of them on his commentary track. Among the scenes I would have liked to see: Bill Murray trashing his room (instead of merely breaking the pencil in half), and him presiding over a Fellini-esque bacchanal of freaks and cripples in his room at Mrs. Lancaster's! For uber-fans of the film, it is immensely disappointing that these scenes were not included, since it is difficult to see how we will ever get to see them now. As for Ramis's commentary, it is lazy and uninteresting. There are a few moments when he shares information that you otherwise wouldn't have known (unless you've seen that HBO documentary), but for the most part his monologue is characterized by simply telling us what's going to happen, explaining what's fully obvious, echoing the lines of the characters, or simply leaving us with long periods of silence. I expect nothing but non-stop talking when directors do their commentaries. And friend and I were watching this, and we both FORGOT that we were watching it with the director's commentary. "Talk, screwball!" we both shouted. One shouldn't be able to get into the movie with this option on, but here his comments were either so sparse or perfunctory that we found ourselves able to. My rating for the movie itself couldn't be higher. I just feel these "special features" weren't worth the wait.
Rating:
Summary: Watch this over and over!
Review: This is a great movie. Bill Murray at his funniest. And this new and improved DVD is a treat! The first one was a "bare-bones" edition, with no special features. This one is nowhere near the calibur of the latest & greatest DVD's (Moulin Rouge, Episode I) as far as extra features go, but there is a great half-hour retrospective documentary featuring all the major players in this film except Bill Murray. This movie was also one of the greatest romantic comedies (or pure comedies) of the past decade. Bill Murray is dead-on as the weatherman who fancies himself a big-time talent and celebrity who gets stuck in a town because of a blizzard, only to be stuck there repeating the same day for seemingly forever. I felt this movie did a great job exploring the progression of how a person would first exploit that type of situation, then get depressed by it, then accept it. I definitely recommend this movie.
Rating:
Summary: My Favorite Movie
Review: This is one of those movies that people either really like, or really dislike. I'm one of the former. Bill Murray is hilarious, and easy for work-stressed boomers to identify with. This movie made me fall in love with Andie McDowell -- unfortunately she just got hitched. If you like Bill Murray, you should also check out Rushmore.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best comedies, ever.
Review: I laughed so hard when I saw this movie. It works in every aspect: the jokes, the story, the romantic twist, the ending, it is a really perfect comedy. And it is even touching.
By the way, Bill Murray is GREAT here, he was born to do this role.
Rating:
Summary: Perfection
Review: This is Bill Murray at his best. I have owned this movie for about three years and I have watched it at least 50 times. It makes me laugh everytime. Phil (Bill Murray) is an obnoxious weatherman who has to repeat the same day over and over until he gets it right. This is a must own and a must see movie. I rate it as one of the top ten comedies I have ever seen.
Rating:
Summary: Best Film of '93, How Good is the Special Edition Though?
Review: Groundhog Day is perhaps the finest comedy of the 90's and best film of '93 (sadly I never saw Schindler's List). Bill Murray's performance is perhaps his best as the man who has to re-live the same day, Groundhog Day (the holiday he loathes). If you're wondering whether or not you should re-buy, or buy for the first time this Groundhog Day Special Edition, I'll take you through the extras. Well, the first DVD of groundhod day had a pretty mediocre (but anamorphic) transfer. This transfer is newly done and much sharper. The DVD is NOT DTS. There is no DTS soundtrack on this film, it says there is a DTS soundtrack on the back but it's mistaken. The audio commentary from Director Harold Ramis (they should have gotten mr. murray to do one). The documentary is interesting, it's length is perfect and it's pretty funny watching how the film was done. It also includes a nice booklet, trailers, and production notes. Overall, Groundhog Day is a real winner. It's a must for everyone's DVD library. This timeless film needs to be enjoyed on DVD over and over again!
|
