Spitfire Grill

“The Spitfire Grill” is the first movie in a while I just don’t know what to think of. Most movies today immediately take off and grab the audiences’ attention within the first ten minutes. This movie was unbearably slow and didn’t pick up at all until the very end. Fighting against their rich accents and boring story, it was hard to stay awake.

            Percy Talbott (Alison Elliott) was just released from prison and finds work in the family owned Spitfire Grill, in Gillead, Main. As she tries to fit into the small community she can’t seem to be accepted. When the owner, Hannah Ferguson (Ellen Burstyn), falls and can’t take care of the grill, Percy takes over and with the help of Shelby Goddard (Marcia Gay Harden) they find a way to raise money to save the grill from closing. With the town beginning to fall in love with Percy, Nahum Goddard (Will Patton), Shelby’s husband and Hannah’s son, starts to recognize the shift of power in the town from within his grasp to Percy. A young girl such as Percy, who was in prison for killing a man, should not have such power over the town.

            Along with the drama within the town Percy finds a man living in the woods who she calls Johnny B. (John M. Jackson), that she desperately tries to hunt down and talk to. This man and what he represents in this movie is the only thing that I enjoyed. To Percy he represents the hope that she has in her future. The hope that one day she will be forgiven of her past mistakes. To Hannah he represents the hope that her first son is still alive. He never came home from Vietnam but they never found his body. To Nahum he is all that he hates. His jealousy towards Percy, his anger at his mother for never appreciating him, his jealously towards his late brother for being the town’s favorite, his attitude towards his wife.  Nahum will find any way to destroy the pact that he thinks Percy has with this mysterious woodsman. Within this character there are so many different representations of him and who he is even though he never speaks a word. In a lot of ways he is the “God” figure in this movie, and Percy is “Jesus.” Johnny B. is the one the town is always trying to find because they know he’s there and yet can’t find him. Percy is Jesus-like because she brings the town together in a way that they never knew was possible. She brings hope and happiness to a dying land in the promise of a brighter future.

            I’m sure there are many more hidden meanings to this movie that I have missed but after about half an hour of this movie I couldn’t find something or someone in this movie that I could latch on to. Their accents were extremely tough to understand at times, and after seeing almost nothing change for an hour I got bored of watching it. I stopped listening to what was really going on and didn’t pay attention to what the meaning of the story was. It has a great end and a meaningful story, but it takes a long time to get there. 

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Groundhog Day

If there were one holiday that you hated most, one holiday that you dreaded, one holiday that you tried to skip year after year, anybody would do everything in their power to stay as far away as they can from it.  What would happen if someone had to live that day over and over again, exactly the same, every time, forever?

          Phil (Bill Murray) is a self-centered celebrity weatherman who absolutely hates Groundhog Day but is forced to visit Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania every year to cover the story. This year seems to be the same boring story but when he wakes up the next morning and finds that he has indeed woken back up to Groundhog Day, hilarious insanity ensues. In the beginning of the movie it’s all about Phil figuring out how to deal with the fact that he is living out his worst nightmare and can’t find a way out. No matter what he tries it always ends up with him waking up on February 2 in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. He quickly finds ways to benefit from his dilemma and begins to take advantage of people. Phil is able to steal money, have one night stands with a woman, drive drunk and almost kill his friends, eat everything he can get his hands on, smokes, treat his coworkers like trash and never have any repercussions. After living for only himself he quickly becomes bored and lonely. A life lived with the only goal of benefitting yourself can be a very successful life, but in the end is it really worth it?

            Phil realizes that he is a very lonely man so he learns about everyone else’s life in the town. He shifts his concentration onto others instead of himself. He tries to save an old man’s life, he rescues a boy from falling out of a tree, he saves the mayor from choking on some meat, he replaces a flat tire for some old ladies, and on and on. He discovers the true beauty in life is in helping and caring for others. When he discovers this he finally finds a way into the life of his producer Rita (Andie MacDowell). He had been trying to hard to get her attention and find a way to end up with her in bed with him but couldn’t get it. As soon as he gave up on finding his own happiness and started concentrating on helping others he became the better man she always wanted. It was then that the two of them became one and fell in love. It wasn’t when they finally had sex, but when they were true to themselves and cared for each other. This is a great story that portrays the effects that a single man can have on an entire society just by his attitude. Phil’s attitude affected the way he treated people and how people treated him. When all that changes, his world can change.

            Bill Murray used his comic genius to traverse the emotional journey from self-centered bigot to an adoring passionate man who found the love he always wanted. "Groundhog Day" is a classic tale of self-discovery that will stick with you for years to come. 

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