One of the films that cannot be missing from the list of titles to watch on the last day of the year is “New Year’s Eve in New York”, a 2011 film directed by Garry Marshall which reports the same artistic intuition as Appointment with love. A sentimental comedy that has added value: the big apple with its lights and background noise, the ideal stage to tell it.
Just let time pass towards midnight, while the characters search for an answer, forgiveness or simply someone to toast with and the New Year’s Eve immediately becomes special. But above all, with this film we experience the wait for the new cycle to begin, and the resignation to what is left behind.
Plot and characters
An already definable film “classico”in which the real protagonist it’s the atmosphere. Precisely that of New Year’s Eve, experienced by many with one sort of anxiety and adrenalinewhere everything becomes a race against time. Claire is committed to ensuring the perfect execution of the traditional ball drop Times Squarewhile he searches to spend his last moments with his seriously ill father. In the hospital, the nurse Aimee tries to keep alive the bond with her distant military boyfriend, suddenly interrupted by duty.
Tess and her husband Griffin they experience with irony the competition with another couple to give birth to the first baby of the year, while the music star Jensen tries to win back his ex-partner Laura, left a year earlier. Ingrida tired and dissatisfied secretary, decides to change her life by making her dreams come true, helped by a young stranger.
In the meantime, Randy, cartoonist disillusioned with New Year’s Eve, gets stuck in the elevator with the choir girl Elise and rediscovers love, while Kima single mother, tries to protect her teenage daughter Haileywho still manages to experience his first midnight kiss. Left alone, Kim has the opportunity to rediscover a relationship left unsolved.
One of the film’s strong points it’s precisely the variety of characters with each story which in turn has its own emotion, but converging towards a single direction: the search for meaning in the moment of passage. The film features an impressive cast, spanning cinema, television and music: Da Robert De Niro a Michelle Pfeiffer, da Sarah Jessica Parker a Zac Efron, passing through Jon Bon Jovihosts and guest stars in surprising cameos. The pleasure also lies in recognizing them all. The director manages to manage this together with skill, relying on the charisma of the performers rather than psychological depth. Not all stories have the same narrative weight, but the fast pace and the steady approach of midnight they hold everything together, like a countdown typical of the moment.
On the cover: New Year’s Eve in New York-Copyright Warnerbros-badtaste
