tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/bill-murray-26594/articlesBill Murray – The Conversation2023-02-01T19:12:12Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1986682023-02-01T19:12:12Z2023-02-01T19:12:12ZThe pleasure and pain of cinephilia: what happened when I watched Groundhog Day every day for a year<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506974/original/file-20230130-935-h5lwde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C1%2C989%2C549&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Columbia Pictures</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“What would you do if you were stuck in one place, and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?” </p>
<p>So asks time-stranded weatherman Phil Connors, played by Bill Murray, as he begins to come to grips with his predicament in the 1993 comedy classic Groundhog Day. </p>
<p>On February 2, while reporting on the annual Groundhog Festival in the quaint Pennsylvanian town of Punxsutawney, Phil becomes trapped in a time warp where he lives the same day over and over again.</p>
<p>In 2021 I was wrestling with the same question. Living in lockdown, I was feeling frustration, ennui, and like forward progress had ground to a halt. The circumstances created an opportunity to subject myself to a very unusual challenge: to watch the same film once a day, every day, for a year. </p>
<p>As a film scholar and cinephile, I wanted to find out how well a movie would sustain this kind of viewing and what a viewer might get out of the experience. Groundhog Day was the natural candidate. </p>
<p>On a Monday morning in September of 2021, I sat down on my couch and hit play.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/when-each-pandemic-day-feels-the-same-phil-the-weatherman-in-groundhog-day-can-offer-a-lesson-in-embracing-life-mindfully-153605">When each pandemic day feels the same, Phil the Weatherman in "Groundhog Day" can offer a lesson in embracing life mindfully</a>
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<h2>The act of watching</h2>
<p>In the first month, my primary engagement was with the narrative. </p>
<p>Like many previous viewers, I found myself asking how long Phil was trapped in the loop for (my own approximation is 30 years, which sits between the 10 years offered by director Harold Ramis and the 10,000 years in the original screenplay by Danny Rubin). </p>
<p>I questioned the credibility of Rita (Andie MacDowell) falling in love with Phil having only known him for a day. I wondered how much of Murray’s performance was improvised (in Rubin’s words, <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/qhkyh/comment/c3xp27e/">some “colouring”</a> but proportionally less than is assumed).</p>
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<p>Gradually, my familiarity with the narrative led me to shift focus. Rewatching became about exploration, as I sought to discover details the average viewer may have missed. </p>
<p>I began to notice the re-occurrence of certain extras from scene to scene, building my own narrative around their identities. I realised the boy in a wheelchair in the background of the hospital scene is the same boy Phil will eventually save from breaking his leg every day. </p>
<p>I consumed as much extra material on the film as possible. <a href="https://howtowritegroundhogday.com/">Rubin’s screenplay</a> and accompanying commentary, film critic Ryan Gilbey’s <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/groundhog-day-9781838716035/">detailed monograph</a> and Harold Ramis’s commentary were all illuminating. I realise in hindsight that I was following my natural inclination as a scholar, to try to understand something more fully by diving more deeply into it. </p>
<p>And then I reached the doldrums. </p>
<h2>Shifting perspectives</h2>
<p>By the midway point, my viewing had shifted into a mode of cataloguing and memorisation. Phil Connors’ weather reports ran through my head unbidden, and I had built myself a mental map of Punxsutawney to the extent I felt like I could give directions to a visitor. I began to talk to the film as it played. </p>
<p>Some days, the viewing felt like a curse.</p>
<p>When Rita discovers Phil’s dilemma, she says: “Maybe it’s not a curse. Maybe it depends on how you look at it.” </p>
<p>My own shift in perspective came into play in the final three months. I found myself returning to the exploratory mode of viewing, encouraged by sharing and discussing theories with others who liked the film but who weren’t nutty enough to watch it hundreds of times. </p>
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<p>New theories emerged. </p>
<p>I decided the bartender at the Pennsylvanian Hotel is clearly aware of Phil’s predicament (make note of his knowing looks and how quickly he serves them their favourite drinks), and that one of the Punxsutawney townspeople is clearly having an affair, as he can be seen visiting the Groundhog Festival with his wife and the banquet with his mistress. </p>
<p>I’m not the first to posit <a href="https://www.cbr.com/groundhog-day-movie-theory-ned-ryerson-devil/">alternative readings</a> of the film, but I understood in my final stretch of viewing that a film can transform with us, revealing new layers from viewing to viewing. </p>
<h2>Films as friends</h2>
<p>In recent years, many scholars have examined the practice of repeat viewing, particularly with the emergence of technologies that provide flexibility to view when and where we like. </p>
<p>Film theorist Barbara Klinger <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520245860/beyond-the-multiplex">suggests</a> familiar movies have the capacity to become our “friends” and she introduced the term “karaoke cinema” to describe the joy of deep familiarity and quotability, arguing this experience provides the audience with an element of both comfort and mastery. </p>
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<p>My experience certainly affirms her claims. Watching Groundhog Day every day for a year provided me with a deeper appreciation for how a film may contain multitudes – particularly those we choose to willingly re-experience. </p>
<p>The legacy of Groundhog Day can be seen in the recurring appeal of the time loop narrative in TV shows and films such as Palm Springs, Russian Doll and Happy Death Day. </p>
<p>And, like every piece of worthwhile art, it can also sustain its own deep interrogation and reveal to the curious rewatcher its multifaceted layers and dimensions.</p>
<p>On reaching the finish line I was elated and celebrated with a final viewing on the big screen. I have a feeling it will be some time before I revisit the film, but it’s comforting to know it will be there when I’m ready, an old friend who welcomes visitors. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-groundhog-day-and-my-time-in-a-monastery-taught-me-about-lockdown-143452">What Groundhog Day (and my time in a monastery) taught me about lockdown</a>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adam Daniel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On a Monday morning in September of 2021, I sat down on my couch and hit play.Adam Daniel, Tutor / Lecturer in Film and Media Studies, Western Sydney UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1536052021-01-29T22:15:38Z2021-01-29T22:15:38ZWhen each pandemic day feels the same, Phil the Weatherman in “Groundhog Day” can offer a lesson in embracing life mindfully<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/381200/original/file-20210128-17-n3q9o5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=55%2C0%2C4542%2C3121&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell in a scene from the film 'Groundhog Day.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/bill-murray-and-andie-macdowell-in-a-scene-from-the-film-news-photo/163063765?adppopup=true">Columbia Pictures/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many of us will recall the comic film “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107048/">Groundhog Day</a>.” </p>
<p>Originally released in 1993, it stars the incomparable Bill Murray as Phil Conners, an insufferable Pittsburgh weatherman. A minor local celebrity who believes himself destined for much better things, he resents his piddling assignment to report on the Groundhog Day celebration in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. </p>
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<img alt="Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=26%2C3%2C2493%2C1560&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/381172/original/file-20210128-19-1q2x4lm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Punxsutawney Phil after emerging from his burrow on Gobblers Knob in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/GroundhogDay/bd8d5370e7854bfea728a485b9c16bbf/photo?Query=groundhog&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=603&currentItemNo=11">AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar</a></span>
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<p>The plan is to return to Pittsburgh after the festivities. But when a blizzard shuts down the highway, Phil finds himself trapped in Punxsutawney. He wakes up the next day, only to discover that it’s not the next day at all. It’s Groundhog Day all over again. </p>
<p>For some reason he’s trapped in Feb. 2, forced to relive the same day over and over again. </p>
<p>“What if there is no tomorrow?” he asks at one point, adding: “There wasn’t one today.” </p>
<p>It is a question that will resonate with millions forced to stay indoors as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus spreads and people wake up every morning wondering if the day ahead will be any different from the 24 hours they have just endured.</p>
<p>But I have a more positive spin. As a <a href="https://cas.la.psu.edu/people/jde13">scholar of communication and ethics</a>, I argue that the lesson at the heart of the movie is that because we can never count on tomorrow, life must be lived fully in the present, not just for oneself, but also for others. Ultimately, “Groundhog Day” gives us a lesson in mindfulness. </p>
<h2>Metaphor for mindlessness?</h2>
<p>Phil was trapped in Groundhog Day, perhaps for hundreds of years. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/21/movies/groundhog-day.html">The original script said 10,000 years, though the director reportedly said it was 10</a>. Either way, that’s a long time to wake up to the same song every morning. </p>
<p>Finally, Phil awakens, and it’s Feb. 3, that is, the next day.</p>
<p>I believe what brings about tomorrow for Phil is that he learns to practice mindfulness. </p>
<p>Phil’s repetitive existence can stand for a metaphor for mindlessness, for how we all get stuck in cycles of reactivity, addiction and habit. Locked in our routines, life can lose its luster. </p>
<p>It can quickly seem like nothing we do matters all that much. “What would you do if you were stuck in one place, and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?” Phil asks two local guys at the bowling alley. “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DazUImBLEhM">That about sums it up for me</a>,” one of them responds.</p>
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<p>Contemporary practices of mindfulness can trace their roots back to <a href="https://plumvillage.org/books/the-heart-of-the-buddhas-teaching/">Buddhism</a>. For Buddhists, the concept of reincarnation or <a href="https://www.lionsroar.com/just-more-of-the-same/">rebirth</a> is important. Many Buddhists believe that all living beings go through many births until they achieve salvation.</p>
<p>As a scholar, I believe the idea of rebirth is more complex than is often understood in popular culture. </p>
<p>Pali is the ancient sacred language of Theravada Buddhism. Scholar of Buddhism <a href="https://www.stephenbatchelor.org/index.php/en/stephen">Stephen Batchelor</a> notes that the ancient Pali language word “punabbhava,” often translated as “rebirth,” literally means “<a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300205183/after-buddhism">again-becoming</a>,” or what we might think of as “repetitive existence.” </p>
<p>That’s Phil’s life, stuck in Groundhog Day. That’s what Phil is trying to escape, and what we are all trying to escape in COVID times – repetitive existence, a life stuck in one gear, frozen by habits and patterns that make every day feel the same, as though nothing matters. </p>
<h2>Taking a moment – to respond, mindfully</h2>
<p>If Phil’s stuckness is a metaphor for mindlessness, Phil’s awakening, I argue, is a metaphor for mindfulness. <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/204352/the-miracle-of-mindfulness-by-thich-nhat-hanh/">Mindfulness</a> is the practice of experiencing life as it is happening, squarely in the now, without immediately reacting to it or being carried away by it. </p>
<p>Mindfulness is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nwwKbM_vJc">a practice</a> of getting to know ourselves and our conditioning a little better. Conditioning is an automatic pattern of reacting to the world. By stepping out of autopilot, pausing, and noticing, many of us can find that we <a href="https://www.parallax.org/product/the-mindfulness-survival-kit-five-essential-practices/">are no longer captive </a> to our conditioning. Consequently, we gain the space to make choices about how we want to respond to life.</p>
<p>That is what Phil does in the movie – he escapes repetitive existence by overcoming his initial conditioned, obnoxious, egotistical reactions to the world. At the beginning of the film, he calls himself the “talent” and berates the “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFgpsHrGvWY">hicks</a>” who live in the small town. He is too good for Groundhog Day. He wants to escape Punxsutawney as fast as possible. </p>
<p>As the film continues, Phil accepts his situation and turns repetition into an opportunity for growth. He begins to find meaning in the place where he is trapped. He embraces life, fully, which also means that he notices his own suffering and the suffering of those around him. </p>
<p>Phil addresses his own suffering by pursuing his passions and developing his skills. He learns to play the piano and becomes an accomplished ice sculptor. </p>
<p>Initially, Phil felt nothing for those around him. People were objects to him, if he noticed them at all. By the end of the film, he feels compassion, which, according to the mindfulness teacher <a href="https://www.rhondavmagee.com/about-mindfulness-trainer/">Rhonda Magee</a>, means “<a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/565790/the-inner-work-of-racial-justice-by-rhonda-v-magee-foreword-by-jon-kabat-zinn/">the will to act to alleviate the suffering of others</a>.” Mindfulness is a practice that draws us into the world, into service. <a href="https://pennstate.pure.elsevier.com/en/publications/compassion-and-human-development-current-approaches-and-future-di">Compassion</a> is at the heart of a mindfulness practice.</p>
<h2>Mindfulness in pandemic times</h2>
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<span class="caption">Compassion is at the heart of meditation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-wearing-a-scary-face-mask-clasps-her-hands-in-news-photo/1228160036?adppopup=true">Mark Makela/Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Mindfulness does not mean turning away from <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/rhonda_magee_the_inner_work_of_racial_justice?language=en">difficulty</a>. It is a practice of meeting difficulty with <a href="https://www.tenpercent.com/covid">compassion</a>. Though Phil finally accepts that there might not be a tomorrow, nevertheless he acts to ensure that if tomorrow comes for himself and those around him, it will be better than today. </p>
<p>For example, Phil saves the lives of at least two people: a young boy who, before Phil’s intervention, falls out of a tree onto a hard sidewalk, and the town’s mayor, who, before Phil bursts in to give him the Heimlich, chokes on his lunch. </p>
<p>Phil’s mindful awareness of what is happening in the moment allows him to act for tomorrow without losing track of today. Phil’s mindfulness, and his compassion, drive the film’s central love story between Phil and Rita. At the beginning of the film, he was capable of loving only himself. By the end of the film, Phil has learned to love mindfully.</p>
<p>According to <a href="https://theconversation.com/thich-nhat-hanh-who-worked-for-decades-to-teach-mindfulness-approached-death-in-that-same-spirit-175495">Thich Nhat Hanh</a>, who died recently, <a href="https://www.shambhala.com/true-love-1594.html">loving mindfully</a> means that “you must love in such a way that the person you love feels free.” Phil has learned that love is not about manipulation or possession but about collaboration in making a shared life together. </p>
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<p>To the best of his ability, Phil dedicates himself to alleviating the suffering of others in a present that is real and for a future that might not come. He does this in small acts of compassion like fixing a flat tire and more momentous acts like saving a life. This mindful dedication to the future in the face of uncertainty is, I argue, what allows him to wake up to a new day.</p>
<p>This is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/5-buddhist-teachings-that-can-help-you-deal-with-coronavirus-anxiety-134320">good lesson</a> for us all, stuck, as we are, in a perpetual pandemic Groundhog Day, and dreaming, as we are, of tomorrow.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/153605/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeremy David Engels does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For many of us, the popular film, ‘Groundhog Day’ may bring up fond memories of a classic comedy. But a scholar argues there’s more to the film – it’s a lesson in mindfulness.Jeremy David Engels, Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1434522020-08-05T19:59:36Z2020-08-05T19:59:36ZWhat Groundhog Day (and my time in a monastery) taught me about lockdown<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350977/original/file-20200804-20-8n3km1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C1280%2C697&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
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<p>Phil: What would you do if you were stuck in one place, and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?</p>
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<p>Stage 4 lockdown is upon Melbourne for the next six weeks. How do we cope with the new normal of staying in our houses for 23 hours a day? </p>
<p>One popular solution is to immerse ourselves in stories. Topical films, such as <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1598778/">Contagion</a> (2011), have found a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com.au/how-contagion-became-a-must-see-movie-during-the-coronavirus-2020-4">new life</a> in the pandemic. But a more prescient film, for lockdown, is the cult classic <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107048/">Groundhog Day</a> (1993), directed by Harold Ramis. </p>
<p>Phil Connors (Bill Murray), a thoroughly unsavoury TV weatherman, mysteriously wakes up to the same wintry February morning over and over again. His wonder and excitement at the lack of consequences quickly turn to despair. </p>
<p>How can a flawed human deal with the repetition of the same limited day, as restrictive in its own way as a one-room prison cell?</p>
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<p>Eventually, a major change in perspective allows Phil to transform his prison into fulfilment, granting him the love of Rita (Andie MacDowell) – and the escape back to normal temporality. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-know-what-day-it-is-or-who-said-what-at-the-last-meeting-blame-the-coronavirus-142086">Don't know what day it is or who said what at the last meeting? Blame the coronavirus</a>
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<h2>Transformations</h2>
<p>Over the centuries, countless people have chosen a form of elective lockdown.
When I was 25, I spent a year as a guest at the <a href="http://abbeyofreginalaudis.org/visit-internship.html">Abbey of Regina Laudis in Connecticut</a>. I was not allowed to leave the grounds without permission, and spent my days milking cows, weaving cloth, tending beehives and singing the liturgical celebrations.</p>
<p>I chose to live in the monastery, as did everyone around me. That didn’t mean that the restrictions didn’t chafe. But I remember what one of the sisters said to me about the narrow borders we had placed around our lives: when you can’t change your environment, you have to change yourself. </p>
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<img alt="Phil and Rita at a diner." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350981/original/file-20200804-16-xuk082.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">To make your way through, consider who you want to be.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sony Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That year taught me how to sit with myself and stick to the work <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/52184/poets-work">I had chosen</a> – skills I needed in the difficult seven years of education that followed. </p>
<p>Restrictions can promote transformation through friction, like tomatoes needing compression to be sealed into jars <a href="https://www.newsday.com/lifestyle/restaurants/food-and-drink/how-to-can-tomatoes-1.2248833">for the winter</a>. The condensation, the reduction, are there to produce something new. When we can’t escape we have a tremendous opportunity for change.</p>
<h2>Deadlines</h2>
<p>I recently learned a new etymology. The word “<a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/your-deadline-wont-kill-you">deadline</a>” once referred to a prison boundary, beyond which you would be shot by guards. </p>
<p>For Phil, in Groundhog Day, a “deadline” is what is missing from his life. He cannot die. With that boundary removed from him, he struggles to find meaning at all. Our own lockdown also lacks a firm deadline, a time when it will certainly be over. The Victorian government is saying stage 4 restrictions will last six weeks. But will that be enough? </p>
<p>We are faced with the odd combination of restricted space and endless time.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Phil drinks coffee straight from the jug, over a table filled with donuts." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=909&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=909&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=909&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1142&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1142&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/350980/original/file-20200804-14-1deni2y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1142&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When our lives are the same end on end, do our choices matter?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sony Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Phil experiments with goals at the beginning of the film, but these goals are questionable. He learns all he can about Rita, but only so he can seduce her. He choreographs the perfect robbery of a bank’s armoured truck to have abundant cash. He spends three hours a day for six months learning how to throw playing cards into a hat.</p>
<p>Somewhere in the middle of the story, as he lifts his head from a depression with the help of Rita, Phil turns a corner. He starts to realise his actions – even if they leave no trace on the next repeated day – can change himself, for the better. </p>
<p>He develops a pattern of care that takes up his entire day. He saves a man from choking and a boy from falling from a tree. He helps a young woman get over her cold feet before her wedding and fixes the flat tyres of a car full of elderly ladies. </p>
<p>Instead of short-term goals, he chooses to learn skills that enrich his life: he reads, he makes ice sculptures, he becomes an excellent pianist. He chooses to flourish. </p>
<p>Flourishing is compatible with a notion of infinity – no deadline needed.</p>
<h2>Emotions</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>Rita: Sometimes I wish I had a thousand lifetimes. I don’t know, Phil. Maybe it’s not a curse. Just depends on how you look at it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Being stuck in the repetition of lockdown, while at first causing only frustration, can lead us to evolve from blaming our setting to interrogating ourselves. </p>
<p>Watching Groundhog Day in these times is strangely inspiring. It lets us imagine a repetition in which we can flourish.</p>
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<p>So what will we do with our coming six weeks in Melbourne? I, for one, think I will finally start learning to play the piano. Thanks, Phil.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143452/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dawn LaValle Norman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The 1993 cult classic, in which the same day repeats over and over, contains wisdom for those of us living restricted lives.Dawn LaValle Norman, Research Fellow, Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry, Australian Catholic UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/935792018-03-21T14:39:11Z2018-03-21T14:39:11ZThe father of Ethiopian jazz, Mulatu Astatke, remains a musician in motion<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211022/original/file-20180319-31608-1blu3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mulatu Astatke</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alexis Maryon</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ethiopian jazz master <a href="https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/34361554/ShelemayJazzWorldsrev5.2012.pdf?sequence=3">Mulatu Astatke</a> took a break from his extensive 2018 European concert <a href="https://www.songkick.com/artists/61746-mulatu-astatke">tour</a> to play at the 19th <a href="http://www.capetownjazzfest.com/">Cape Town International Jazz Festival</a>. This should come as no surprise given that he has been in global motion ever since his parents sent him to study aeronautical engineering in North Wales in 1956.</p>
<p>But Mulatu (Ethiopians are traditionally called by their first names) soon began trumpet lessons instead, enrolling in London’s <a href="http://www.trinitycollege.com/site/?id=55">Trinity School of Music</a>. While in London he heard performances by Caribbean and West African musicians that awoke his memories of the big bands he had enjoyed at home in Ethiopia. These performances prodded him to consider new directions. </p>
<p>By 1958 Mulatu was the first African student to enroll at what would soon become the <a href="https://www.berklee.edu/">Berklee College of Music</a> in Boston. There he traded in his trumpet for the vibraphone. By 1960 he was living in New York City, where he spent more than six years taking part in the world of American jazz, interacting with Latin musicians, making records and performing in concerts.</p>
<p>By the time Mulatu returned to Ethiopia later that decade, he had developed the concept of <a href="https://theculturetrip.com/africa/ethiopia/articles/ethio-jazz-the-amazing-story-of-ethiopian-jazz-from-london-to-addis/">“Ethio-Jazz”</a> and was actively experimenting with this new, hybrid musical style. Ethio-Jazz draws on multiple trends from the American jazz scene, including <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-bebop-2039578">bebop</a> and <a href="http://www.jazzstandards.com/theory/modal-jazz.htm">modal jazz</a>, combined with melodies and harmonies based in the Ethiopian modal system. </p>
<h2>Melding of sounds</h2>
<p>Mulatu’s innovations were anchored by his childhood memories of Ethiopian traditional secular and church music. It was further inflected by harmony classes at the Berklee School and welded together by the experience of hearing and playing jazz in London, Boston and New York City. </p>
<p>Mulatu’s pieces over the course of his career retain these early musical influences as well as a highly original mixture of sounds from places experienced on his lifelong itinerary. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Mulatu Astatke’s signature piece ‘Yekermo Sew’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>An example is Mulatu’s signature piece, “Yekermo Sew” (“A Man of Experience and Wisdom”) which was featured in the soundtrack of American independent filmmaker and screenwriter <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000464/">Jim Jarmusch</a>’s 2005 film <a href="http://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/lists/jim-jarmusch-five-essential-films">“Broken Flowers”</a> and then circulated across the world. Composed following Mulatu’s return to Ethiopia in the later 1960s, “Yekermo Sew” takes its title from a traditional Ethiopian Christian new year’s blessing in Amharic, the national Ethiopian language.</p>
<p>Although set in <em><a href="http://fsuworldmusiconline.wikidot.com/music-theory-ethiopian-music">tizita</a></em>, a <a href="http://www.simplifyingtheory.com/pentatonic-scale/">pentatonic</a> (or five note) Ethiopian mode closely associated with feelings of nostalgia for the past, Yekermo Sew’s melody quoted a tune from jazz composer <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/horace-silver-mn0000267354">Horace Silver</a>’s “Song for my Father”. Mulatu transformed Silver’s melody in its phrasing and rhythm as well as expanded its <em><a href="http://www.classical-music.com/article/what-ostinato">ostinato</a></em> – any melodic, rhythmic or chordal phrase, usually short, that’s repeated continuously through a section of a work – accompaniment.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Horace Silver’s ‘Song for my father’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The original recording of “Yekermo Sew” also captured technologies of the 1960s, with a solo on a Fender Rhodes electric piano popular in that era. A guitar fuzz box pedal that modified and distorted the sound, was also used. </p>
<p>It’s clear that “Yekermo Sew” emerged from the rhythms and sounds that Mulatu continued to absorb from Ethiopian music, plus the many new styles he encountered in the course of his professional life. This melding of sounds was reflected in his subsequent compositions, too.</p>
<p>Mulatu never migrated abroad as many Ethiopian musicians did in the difficult years following the <a href="http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/1115/1/U044491.pdf">Ethiopian revolution</a> that began in 1974. He maintained his home in Ethiopia but travelled often to perform concerts, record and introduce his music to an international public.</p>
<p>At home, Mulatu transmitted Ethio-jazz to younger musicians, many of whom today perform in sessions at his <a href="https://www.musicinafrica.net/directory/african-jazz-village-ghion-hotel">African Jazz Village</a>, on a regular basis. He has long researched a variety of Ethiopian traditional musics from far-flung regions of the country and has insured that these little-known styles were circulated in his frequent radio broadcasts. Along the way, Mulatu became a legend in the worldwide Ethiopian diaspora, which he visits frequently on his tours.</p>
<h2>Travelling music</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0412019/">“Broken Flowers”</a> tells the story of Don Johnston (Bill Murray), who embarks on a cross-country road-trip. Jarmusch, the film’s director, said that he’d conceived the character of Don’s next door neighbour, an Ethiopian immigrant writer named Winston (Jeffrey Wright), so that he could use Mulatu’s music as the film’s <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Various-Music-From-Broken-Flowers/release/593559">soundtrack</a>.</p>
<p>In a pivotal scene, Winston presents Don with an itinerary, maps and a CD of what Winston terms “travelling music” for his trip. The subsequent scenes of travel are accompanied by Mulatu’s Ethio-Jazz.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211029/original/file-20180319-31605-1xq8b9h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mulatu and his current band Step Ahead.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alexis Maryon</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>From early in his career, Mulatu and his musical output have been associated with travel. It includes his appearance in a classic poster advertising Ethiopian airlines, which is titled “Going to great lengths to please”.</p>
<p>But in the end, cultural mobility emerges not just as an easy metaphor for
Mulatu’s music, but as the decisive factor that produced Ethio-Jazz.</p>
<p>Without his extraordinary mobility and exposure to a wide range of musical sounds, Mulatu could never have conceived his travelling music. Movement is key to understanding the genesis of Mulatu’s style. He made numerous references to it in an interview I did with him in 2007. It provides a pathway through which we can understand the way in which this music is heard by so many listeners, including Jarmusch, as being emblematic of movement. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/211015/original/file-20180319-31596-12cuje9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A Johnny Walker billboard in Addis Abeba featuring Mulatu.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kay Kaufman Shelemay</span></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>Clearly this association with mobility continues today. During a recent visit to Ethiopia, I passed by a billboard near the centre of downtown Addis Ababa for Johnny Walker scotch featuring Mulatu Astatke.</p>
<p>The caption carries Johnny Walker’s iconic line:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Keep Walking.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It is clear that Mulatu is still “in motion”.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>This article is based in part on Shelemay’s recent article : “Traveling Music: Mulatu Astatke and the Genesis of Ethiopian Jazz.” In Jazz Worlds/World Jazz. Edited by Philip V. Bohlman and Goffredo Plastino. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2016, pp. 239-257.
_</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93579/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kay Kaufman Shelemay receives funding from none at present. I have held many national fellowships in the past, including from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Stanford University Humanities Center, the American Council of Learned Societies, and others.</span></em></p>Veteran Ethiopian jazz musician Mulatu Astatke continues to have an extraordinary mobility and exposure to a wide range of musical sounds.Kay Kaufman Shelemay, G. Gordon Watts Professor of Music and Professor of African and African American Studies, Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/577692016-04-14T13:20:20Z2016-04-14T13:20:20ZJungle Book reimagined: spectacular CGI crafts a whole new reality<p>“Will it be a happy or a sad film?” asks my 11-year-old son in anticipation of Disney’s new reboot of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3040964/">The Jungle Book</a>. The answer depends on your attachment to the <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061852/">famous 1967 animation</a>. Parents looking to entertain young children will find all the same characters and singalong songs, but this is a rather darker outing – and the photo-real animals and live-action Mowgli may come as something of a surprise. They take the world of Hollywood special effects to a level we have never seen before. </p>
<p>Talking animals have come a long way since the 1995 farmyard pig fable <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112431/">Babe</a>, where live-action animals had their mouths animated in post-production to move with the actor’s voice. Though that technique was used as recently as <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1392197/">Marmaduke</a>, the comic-strip adaptation from 2010, there have been great advances in computer-generated imagery (CGI) in recent years. Designers can now create hair, skin and animal movement to a degree of accuracy and realism that has never been possible before. Take the scene of the tiger and the fish on the raft in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0454876/">The Life of Pi (2012)</a>, for instance. </p>
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<p><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1454468/">Gravity (2013)</a> was another groundbreaking movie that combined live action and CGI seamlessly. Sandra Bullock, George Clooney and co were presented in a space environment that was completely fabricated in CGI to create a believable 3D spectacle. The registers of actors’ faces allowed the audience to assume that the rest of the image was similarly real. </p>
<h2>Escape from ‘uncanny valley’</h2>
<p>With The Jungle Book, the challenge for Disney was to create a fully immersive experience by combining this approach to the environment with the latest techniques for creating and animating animals. It is all about avoiding what is sometimes called the “<a href="https://theconversation.com/uncanny-valley-why-we-find-human-like-robots-and-dolls-so-creepy-50268">uncanny valley</a>”, our revulsion to things that are not quite human enough. A team of 850 artists set about this two-year task with a <a href="http://deadline.com/2016/04/the-jungle-book-barbershop-the-next-cut-criminal-box-office-preview-1201736035/">reported budget</a> of US$175m (£123m). </p>
<p>In the new remake, the goofy nature of Bill Murray shines through Baloo the bear, particularly in the eyebrows. Shere Khan carries a more intense level of menace when voiced by Idris Elba than the haughty disdain of George Sanders’ 1967 cartoon tiger. For King Louie, director Jon Favreau <a href="http://www.awn.com/vfxworld/delving-photoreal-world-disney-s-jungle-book-remake">is quoted</a> as saying he wanted him to have blue eyes and “the look and the way [Christopher Walken’s] face is rigged”. </p>
<p>Different CGI specialists have then painstakingly animated layer after layer of detail: to add to the animals there is light, water, atmospherics and plants. Much of it required completely new software to be developed first. Only Mowgli is real. He was shot in a studio in Los Angeles with props and a green screen, with the likes of Bill Murray performing to give 11-year-old newcomer Neel Sethi something to respond to. The director would be viewing a live composite on his monitor to see the draft compilation of the different elements. </p>
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<p>Bringing all the CGI components together convincingly was the responsibility of the visual effects supervisor, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0883628/">Adam Valdez</a>. He began his career in Hollywood working on miniature models for <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100502/">Robocop 2</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107290/">Jurassic Park</a> under the tutelage of Star Wars effects legend <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0864138/">Phil Tippett</a>; before going on to the first two <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120737/">Lord of the Rings</a> movies, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0816711/">World War Z</a> and dark fantasy <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1587310/">Maleficent</a>. </p>
<p>When I interviewed him shortly before he began work on The Jungle Book, he told me he was more concerned with telling a story at an emotional level than just the technicalities:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think I have to work really hard on photorealism because it’s not my personal passion. There are people in <a href="http://www.moving-picture.com">this studio</a> whose personal obsession in a good way is to try to recreate reality in a photographic way where you cannot tell the difference.</p>
<p>With Gravity, I was really impressed and totally bored in the middle at the same time. All that energy to make me believe it’s really happening and I’m really experiencing it completely fulfilled the spectacle experience part, but it was devoid of any interest, ideas, emotions or humanity for me. </p>
<p>I can probably watch a little line-drawing thing and laugh or cry or feel more thought-provoked. Films work in human terms. That’s what gives them meaning.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This sits well with Jon Favreau’s outlook. He has <a href="http://www.awn.com/vfxworld/delving-photoreal-world-disney-s-jungle-book-remake">talked about</a> his desire to introduce these latest effects to audiences in the same way as he saw a different kind of effects for the first time when he watched <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0499549/">Avatar</a>. As he put it, “It’s the marriage of story and technology that always makes for an interesting presentation”.</p>
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<h2>The filth and the furry</h2>
<p>The new movie combines atmospheric beauty with plenty of animal filth and mud to provide an atypical Disney presentation of jungle existence. The end result is certainly not for toddlers, but a much more visceral achievement nearer the spirit of Rudyard Kipling’s <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77270.The_Jungle_Book">original stories</a> than previous adaptations (there is also the <a href="http://moria.co.nz/fantasy/junglebook1942.htm">1942 epic</a>, the <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110213/">1994 live action remake</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/list/ls071442932/">various other animations</a>). </p>
<p>It’s worth pointing out an irony here for people familiar with the work of the French philosopher <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/baudrillard/">Jean Baudrillard</a>. Baudrillard famously talked about
how Disneyland as a theme park full of cartoon animals was more honest and even “real” than the rest of America. You wonder what he would make of Disney combining the latest CGI and darker storytelling to move from make-believe to something that actually presents as reality. It certainly raises fascinating questions for the future of film-making. </p>
<p>So far The Jungle Book has been garnering praise from respectable places: 100% from <a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_jungle_book_2016/">Rotten Tomatoes</a>, 5/5 from <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/the-jungle-book-film-review-groundbreaking-and-magical-a6982196.html">The Independent</a>, and 4/5 from the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/film/the-jungle-book/review/">Daily Telegraph</a> and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/apr/12/the-jungle-book-review">the Guardian</a>. The Independent calls it “groundbreaking and magical” and describes Sethi’s performance as Mowgli as “remarkable”. Everyone else will be able to see what the reality looks like when it goes on UK release on April 15. Do remember to hold on to your bananas.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/57769/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Iain Macdonald has previously received funding from the HEA and Carnegie Trust, though not attached to this article.</span></em></p>Welcome to Disney’s latest adaptation, where the only thing that’s real is Mowgli.Iain Macdonald, Associate Professor of Advertising and Graphic Design, Edinburgh Napier UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.