Who knew February 1993 would be so big for ground squirrels?
30 Years by Jorge Ignacio Castillo

Prairie Dog has impacted my life in countless ways. So much so, my epitaph will read “Here lies Jorge Castillo. Three prairie dogs out of five”. (My wife doesn’t approve.)
But as we mark three decades of this honorable (sometimes), bi-weekly (-ish) paper, we must note that 2023 also marks another burrowing rodent’s 30th anniversary: Punxsutawney Phil, the titular marmot of Groundhog Day.
I’m celebrating the former with this column about the latter — a personal favourite I’ve never had much opportunity to write about.
Groundhog Day hit theatres on Feb. 12, 1993. It’s a modern classic that’s inspired dozens of inferior movies in every genre (no, millennials: Palm Springs doesn’t come close). The movie takes a Twilight Zone-worthy scenario and gives it a twist: if you were to relive the same day over and over, how long it would it take you to realize this is a golden opportunity to better yourself?
In Phil Connors’ case, a couple of decades, believed writer/director Harold Ramis. Thousands of years, according to Bill Murray, the man in Phil’s shoes. My editor, who guesses he’s worked somewhere around 600 Prairie Dog deadline days, probably identifies.
Movies are artifacts of their time. This is why the “this film couldn’t be made today” observation is so dumb. Yet Groundhog Day remains curiously — and fittingly — timeless. Murray’s character is appealing because he’s so human. Selfish. Petty. Smug. He sticks to those traits too, until the movie’s last 20 minutes.
Some believe Groundhog Day wouldn’t fly today because Phil Connors has “cancelled” written all over him. I believe it’s one of the elements that keep Groundhog Day relevant: Phil is pure toxic masculinity, who, in the hedonistic stage of his journey, borders on predatorial. The Nancy segment is a lot less palatable when you think about how Phil gleefully abuses his magic groundhog day knowledge to sleep with someone who otherwise wouldn’t be interested.
It’s Rita (Andie McDowell at the peak of her romantic-female-lead powers) who makes Phil see women as people. It’s not even love — it’s the realization a woman can be a fully formed individual that crashes through Phil’s thick, chauvinistic skull and changes him. (It’s depressing that 30 years later this message still escapes the likes of Jordan Peterson and his incel fan club.)
While some believe Connors’ enlightenment explains his escape from his purgatorial loop, others find his redemption insincere. I’m in the latter camp: Bill Murray is great at making morally compromised characters likeable, but going from there to “sincere and endearing” in a single movie stretches his skill and he’s clearly straining at the end. Murray has acting chops, but he’s no Meryl Streep.
What I do especially love is Groundhog Day’s elegant disinterest for traditional plot logic. The film never explains why Phil is stuck in time, but you don’t feel it needs to. This kind of oblivious, existential anarchy is also a quality Prairie Dog embodies as a Gen-X founded alternative newspaper in one of the least likely cities imaginable.
In 2023, the current cultural multiverse craze owes a debt of gratitude to director Harold Ramis and co. for expanding general audiences’ minds to contemplate realities piling on top of each other. Regina might owe Prairie Dog a similar debt for bucking tedious conservative talking points and dreary aversion to progress for three decades. Happy anniversary! ■
Jorge Ignacio Castillo is the first Chilean-born chair of the Vancouver Critics Film Circle. Over his 20-year (-ish) Prairie Dog and Planet S career, he’s lived in Saskatoon, Vancouver, Toronto, and Vancouver (again). He is Rotten Tomatoes-certified. We give him three and a half prairie dogs out of five.