Groundhog Day - Groundhog Day in Popular Culture

Groundhog Day in Popular Culture

• At the end of Disney's 1930 Silly Symphonies short film Winter, Mr. Groundhog the Weather Prophet comes out of his hole to determine whether or not there will be more winter. At first, he does not see his shadow, but the clouds clear and his shadow appears, causing him to run back inside. At this point, the winds picks up again and winter continues.
• The 1941 Woody Woodpecker short Pantry Panic portrays the groundhog as a weather forecaster, although in this case he forecasts the timing of the beginning of winter, not the end of it.
• The 1947 Warner Bros. cartoon One Meat Brawl features Grover Groundhog singing the "Groundhog Song" with music by Carl W. Stalling and lyrics by Warren Foster.
• In the 1979 Rankin-Bass Christmas TV special Jack Frost, a crucial plot point in the story involves Jack casting his own shadow on Groundhog Day for six more weeks of winter. At the end of the story it is revealed that the narrator (voiced by Buddy Hackett) is the groundhog.
• The 1993 comedy movie Groundhog Day takes place in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania on this day (although the majority of the movie was actually filmed in Woodstock, Illinois). The main character (played by Bill Murray) is forced to relive the day over and over again until he can learn to give up his selfishness and become a better person. In popular culture, the phrase "Groundhog Day" has come to represent going through a phenomenon over and over until one spiritually transcends it.
• In Disney's 2006 film Bambi II, Bambi accompanies his friends Thumper and Flower to go and see the Groundhog, whose shadow will foretell if winter will end soon.