Groundhog Shack

Coming back from a one-month hiatus, I want to kick off 2017 with a good old off-the-wall movie fan theory. Since Groundhog Day was earlier this month, I think it's only fitting to discuss the movie Groundhog Day -- and how it could work as a prequel to Caddyshack.

In case anyone doesn't know the premise of these films, Groundhog Day is about a grouchy weatherman named Phil Connors who gets trapped in a time loop and has to relive the same day of his life (which falls on the titular holiday) over and over again until he figures out how to do everything right. Caddyshack is about a teenage country club caddy trying to make money for college while an eccentric new club member clashes with the snobby regulars and an insane groundskeeper named Carl Spackler battles wits with a gopher that's tunneling through the golf course. Today's fan theory is that Carl from Caddyshack is actually Phil from Groundhog Day who lost his mind after his experience in the time loop and assumed a new identity.

The first piece of evidence to support this is the creative team behind these films. Not only are Phil and Carl both played by Bill Murray, but both movies were directed and cowritten by Harold Ramis. While Groundhog Day may not have been intended as a prequel to Caddyshack, it's entirely possible that Murray and Ramis subconsciously incorporated elements of Carl into Phil's character arc.

For instance, we see that the two characters are each very mellow and detached from their surroundings. While this can be chalked up to Bill Murray just being Bill Murray in both performances, the characters aren't exactly alike. We see that Phil is much more lucid and expressive than Carl at the beginning of Groundhog Day. It's only as his ordeal of reliving the same day goes on longer and longer that we see him slip into a deep depression, start to lose touch with his emotions and surroundings, and become much more like the crazy groundskeeper from Caddyshack. This is especially apparent in a scene where he kidnaps the Punxsutawney Phil groundhog and talks to it while driving both of them off of a cliff in a failed suicide attempt. It's as if he comes to see the ground-dwelling rodent as the cause of all his torment and decides that destroying such an animal -- even an entirely different one that lives on a golf course -- is a suitable way of restoring order in the world.

In turn, we can also find hints of Phil in Carl's behavior. Phil is a weatherman in Groundhog Day, a job that requires him to narrate a great deal of what he does to a viewing audience that he never actually sees. Similarly, Carl in Caddyshack has a habit of discussing his plans and explaining his actions out loud even when he is completely alone. It could be that Carl retained some of his old identity and is still under the delusion that he's being watched by an audience that he needs to keep informed.

One problem with this theory is that it seems to conflict with the ending of Groundhog Day. In that movie, Phil breaks his curse by changing his ways and learning new skills and then gets the girl in the end. This is a happy ending, so how does it fall apart by the beginning of Caddyshack?

The answer could lie in the very last scene of Groundhog Day. As Phil and his new girlfriend Rita emerge from the house where they're staying in Punxsutawney, he remarks how beautiful the scenery around them is and suggests that the two of them buy a house together in that town. Rita makes no comment on this sporadic idea, not even when Phil backtracks by suggesting that they just start off renting. Harold Ramis speculated that Phil spends a decade in the time loop at the very least; considering this, the character is probably so rearing to finally get on with his life at the movie's end that he may be moving too fast.

It's easy to imagine this rushed, impulsive behavior pushing Rita to leave him somewhere down the line, and since the two of them are coworkers, it's also conceivable that Phil might impulsively decide to quit his job after losing the woman that he spent so much time pining for. From there, he could very well continue on a mental downward spiral as he struggles to fathom the point of his time loop experience until his love of scenery makes him take up caddying. This could eventually lead to his meeting with the Dalai Lama on a golf course that he recounts in Caddyshack, in which the Buddhist leader promises him "total consciousness" if he dies on his death bed (as opposed to committing suicide, perhaps). Maybe this encounter inspires Phil to assume a new identity and embrace his new life on the golf course now that he has the assurance that everything will make sense to him one day. It just so happens that the sudden arrival of another ground-dwelling rodent into his life resurrects his long-dormant hatred for them.

This is admittedly a dark interpretation of Groundhog Day, as it seems to dismiss all of the good will in that movie. Bear in mind though that Harold Ramis was a follower of Buddhism and that he incorporated several Buddhist themes into the script, such as reincarnation and finding happiness by shedding selfish desires. Another major aspect of Buddhism is the idea that achieving simplicity in one's life is important in finding peace of mind. Well, people don't get much simpler than Carl from Caddyshack.

What's especially interesting about Carl's subplot is that for as much as he considers the golf course gopher to be his "enemy," he never seems all that angry while plotting to destroy it. If anything, he seems to find a lot of joy in hatching his schemes. It's as if the intention of the time loop wasn't to prepare him for bigger and grander things in his life like Groundhog Day suggests, but rather to make him incompatible with the busy, unfulfilling life that he had and force him into a much simpler existence.

Some may consider this notion to be dark as well, but in a movie like Groundhog Day that features womanizing, suicide, and murdering a cute, innocent animal, darkness certainly has its place. Actually, you can argue that the wackier and more cartoonish world of Caddyshack is a much happier place for Phil/Carl to live, and all evidence in his scenes seems to support that he is in fact happy. Perhaps the real intention of the time loop wasn't to prepare Phil spiritually for anything, but rather to test him spiritually and then eventually reward him for passing that test.

Carl may not be living with Rita in a big house with a white picket fence, but his time loop ordeal has led him to another paradise, even if that paradise is full of gopher holes.

"The Jungle Book" Review

Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book is a curious case when it comes to movie adaptations. Several different versions of it have been put to film over the years, but they never seem to want to follow the plot of the source material. They'll often pick one portion of the story to tell (usually the first part where the tiger Shere Kahn is the main villain) or simply borrow elements from Kipling's work while telling a different story altogether. I don't know why Hollywood steers away from faithfully adapting this tale, but nowadays The Jungle Book seems to be more iconic for its characters and their motivations than for what those characters do.

The newest film, produced by Disney and directed by Jon Favreau, also takes liberties with its story. It's a remake of the 1967 animated film first and foremost, so it focuses on the boy Mowgli traveling to the man village to escape from Shere Kahn and only gives a few glimpses of the other humans throughout. Unlike the animated film though, this one actually has quite a few nods to the source material. Not only do the wolves who raised Mowgli play a much bigger role in this version, but we also see some of the book's darker aspects like Shere Kahn trying to corrupt the younger wolves and Mowgli realizing that man is too destructive to be compatible with nature. There's also a scene involving Mowgli, Shere Kahn, and a valley full of water buffalo that feels like an ironic wink at the tiger's comeuppance in the book.

Most notable are this movie's frequent mentions of the Law of the Jungle, the strict rules of nature that the animals teach Mowgli to live by. This concept is what really gave Kipling's tale its identity, and this new movie is one of the few versions I've seen that centers around it so strongly. The story might not be very close, but in terms of tone and feel, Jon Favreau's film is one of the better adaptations of the book.

That's not to say that the tone always redeems its story, however. The beginning is probably its weakest part, and that hurts this film a lot. We don't learn how Mowgli came to live in the jungle until about the story's halfway point, which makes it difficult to form an emotional connection to him and most of the other characters. It's like the film decides to skim over its setup because it assumes that audiences already know its characters and conflict, and that doesn't work. There's also a major plot point that more than one character somehow learns about offscreen, which makes for a lot of confusion when they break the news of it to Mowgli. The film's final scene might also make a few people scratch their heads, especially if they are familiar with The Jungle Book's story, but it's harmless.

Another element that can make or break a film's story is how well the actors perform it. I wouldn't say that the cast of Favreau's film is as strong as the 1967 lineup, but it helps that some of the characters in this version have very different personalities than their cartoon counterparts. Bill Murray as Baloo the bear, for instance, is a much better casting choice than you might think after you see what kind of character he is in this movie. Instead of the big-hearted and fun-loving Baloo from 1967, we get a disinterested con artist who frowns on following the rules and develops a conscience by the end of the story. Murray plays that quite well, and since the believability of the character relationships is an issue with this movie, making Baloo's relationship with Mowgli insincere at first helps a lot.

Most of the other actors do a fine job, particularly Neel Sethi as Mowgli. The only performance that falls flat for me is Scarlett Johansson as Kaa the snake. Kaa has an odd history with adaptations to begin with, since he was a hero in the book but is almost always a villain in the movies. I don't mind that they made the character female in this version, but this incarnation of Kaa is supposed to be a crafty temptress, and Johansson's voice doesn't quite reach the necessary level of that. Someone like Angelina Jolie or maybe Michelle Pfeiffer would've been a better choice, in my opinion.

And then there's Christopher Walken as King Louie the orangutan.

I think a lot of people had the same gut feeling when they learned that Christopher Walken would be playing a giant, singing ape in this movie: that his performance was either going to be incredibly awesome, a complete train wreck, or both. And it was both, which of course is the best kind of Christopher Walken performance. I suspect that the filmmakers are also aware of the actor's bizarre, comedic appeal, because in this version, Louie makes his first appearance when Mowgli rings a cowbell.

Having said that, I can't really say if Walken's performance makes this movie entertaining for the right reasons. King Louie is a hard character to pin down in film because he was never actually in the book; he was created for the animated film as a means to include another song and was named after the swing musician who voiced him. He was tailor-made for that specific movie, and because he has no place in the source material, none of the Jungle Book movies that he's appeared in since then has quite known what to do with him. Having him sing in this newest film is especially strange because this version isn't even really a musical. I give Favreau's team credit for trying to make Louie more important to the story in this film, as he reveals that big plot point to Mowgli, but the scene leading up to that is just so odd that it overshadows any emotional impact of the reveal.

Overall though, the newest version of The Jungle Book is an enjoyable film. It's obviously meant for children, but it's heavy enough for adults to appreciate it too, and while it can be underwhelming and awkward at times, it has just as many strong and solid moments. If it looks like something you think you'll like, then you probably will like it. It's worth at least one viewing on the big screen.

And for anyone who wishes that it followed the book more closely, don't give up hope. There's already another Jungle Book movie in the works that's aiming to come out two years from now.