It's Groundhog Day. Again.

Some films stick out in your memory for certain reasons. You don't just remember when you saw a certain movie but where you were, who you were with, what you did afterwards. You know a movie is special to you when you know the history behind the first time you watched it.

I don't know why I never saw Groundhog Day in the theaters. My mother hates with extreme prejudice parents who bring little kids to movies, so it shouldn't surprise me that I didn't see a movie in a theater until I was 8 or so. My mom wanted to see it, too, but for some reason, when it came out on video, I chose to rent Surf Ninjas instead.

So circa 1994, I'm on Spring Break in Florida, and I'm fairly sure we went to Universal Studios and Sea World that year. The special thing about Spring Break for me back then was that the hotels had cable, which I didn't have growing up, including HBO, which is like, super cable. And, as luck would have it, Groundhog Day was on the first night we were in Florida. So we watched it. I've loved it ever since.

I did a project about it for AP English my junior year of high school where I traced the Jungian principle of the anima and the animus through Bill Murray's character arc. My memory is a tad hazy but I'm pretty sure I got an A because, obviously.

The funny thing is, I've only owned it on DVD for maybe a year, and it's still in the shrinkwrap. I guess I've seen it so many times already I know it by heart, and I'm not in dire need of seeing it again. My family taped it off TBS once. We had to fast forward through the commercials while watching it. Funny how my parents are okay with that but would never torrent anything.

It was filmed in Woodstock, IL, instead of Punxsutawney. If I had a car I'd totally road trip there.

Upon further reflection, Groundhog Day might have even impacted me as a cinephile. The scenes were Bill Murray is trying to save the homeless man from dying are the first where I can remember being strongly moved by a film. I didn't really get hooked on movies until I saw 2001 a few years later, but Groundhog Day likely planted the seeds.

Now that I'm older, I recognize more things. Like Stephen Tobolowsky's performance. When he dies, ten bucks says the obituary headline lists him as "Groundhog Day actor." Or how only a few years ago, I understood what Bill Murray meant when he says a character "makes noises like a chipmunk when she gets *real* excited." Remember, I was young when it first came out.

For a long time, whenever somebody asked me what my favorite movie was, I'd always say Star Wars because I loved the original trilogy when I was growing up. It didn't hit me until college that, purely in terms of the movie on its own merits, it was Groundhog Day. Recently, there have been some pretty good contenders - Wall-E, anyone? But I have to go with my childhood favorite. Don't worry, Groundhog Day. I got you, babe.