It is interesting that people have seen groundhog day and not even noticed the girls the guy actually sleeps with in the movie. It is almost like these women are invisible, not even human.
Since no one else has tried, let's take a look at the possible reasons for the guy's bizzarre behavior in the movie.
Firstly is the need to have 'won' something. To be american of course is to be trying to win all the time every time. If I haven't won I can't feel fulfilled. What do you mean Nancy is a great attractive girl who likes you and wants to share and grow with me. Nah. If she likes me already how can I be 'winning' her? No, no, that won't do. Rita there looks so alluring and sexy. I think I have feelings for her. I must chase her. And when I 'win' it will be so awesome! No 1! The desire to win is confused with feelings of love.
So he is interested in the girl only because she is difficult and so gives him the opportunity to try to win. Subsequently comes the complaint, why can't she be easy? Damn, that is some self- destructive behavior.
- Chasing every and last feeling of infatuation and confusing them also with feelings of love. Our base hormonal impulses an reaction can be truely dire at times and pretty random. It is, oddly enough, easy for men to develop an infatuation for the self-obsessed girl. The girl will have spent enough time grooming herself, will preen, seem self-contained and spout all kinds of intellectual jargon. Men can get infatuated with this image.
They can also be thrown into something like a jealous infatuation too. What she is self-contained and uninterested? She is not into me? I must find a way to get her to be into me, I must win her. This is the standard human impulse to want what you don't have or can't have. Those who are smart people pay no attention to this impulse if it comes up at all, focussing on their Nancy.
Those who follow this impulse invariably end up disappointed. If you do get the girl you will be bitterly disappointed to find she is an ordinary girl just like any other, hardly worth the heroic effort. And you may not get along with her at all and wonder what the hell did you throw your life away for.
- The need to be special, this awful disease. After all to be american is to consider yourself special. You have to be a hero. This means you must win a prize, no matter how awful the prize actually is, any ordinary girl won't do. You can't be with a girl who accepts you as you are, who accepts your ordinary qualities maybe even enjoys them, who want's to learn and grow together. Because that would mean you would have to accept your own ordinary qualities too
. What me, have ordinary qualities? No way!
On the other hand to be the hero in a relationship means you are in control all the time, you know everything and never make a mistake. What me, make mistakes? No way! What me, not know everything, not be a master of everything? No way. I'm no 1, no 1! Learn and grow, I don't need to do that.
- The need to be popular. Far too many men, far more than we might think, act out their high school regrets without even knowing it. So Rita will seem like a better catch to show off. How can I like Nancy? She may not make be seem popular.
- The deadly poison of new age romanticism combined with 'happily ever after'. So a good cute girl who treats me well whom I can respect and love is not good enough. I must feel she is my 'soulmate', the one, with whom it will be 'happily ever after' and there is someone out there like that. I know it. I truely believe it from the fiber of my heart! This is some seriously delusional, dangerous narcissism that can only leave people empty handed.
Many of these behaviors are biology-hormone driven and culture is there to guide a person as to how to handle their biological responses. These are not restricted to americans and people are prone anywhere in the world. They can come to the fore in american men because it is easy for this to happen when the culture has collapsed.
This also explains some of this stuff about so many americans having so few friends. If you are always trying to get a leg up in the group, trying to show you are special how can you make friends? Yo, I did so many women, more than you and all that shit. Friends are not people you judge and compete with, friends are people you share with, whom you relax and be yourself with. The more you judge your friends, the less they are friends.
Well, anyone carrying any of these unhapply behavior patterns would be wise to drop them. So the best lesson learned here that is guaranteed to serve you well, oh so unexpectedly revealed by this movie, is this
Take interest in those people who are interested in you and forget about those who are not.
That sounds so simple.
If in some part of the world you find people interested in you which you didn't somewhere else that that is where you must be. But the above rule stands there too.
But anyways, good luck men.