New Year's Eve (2011)
Starring
Halle Berry
Jessica Biel
Jon Bon Jovi
Abigail Breslin
Chris "Ludacris" Bridges
Directed by Garry Marshal
Call me a hopeless romantic, but I liked the movie. Critics panned it as
a waste of time, but I have to be honest, I enjoyed every moment. The romance,
the coming together, and I must add, the lack of suspense, which is a bad
thing, but I was fine knowing what will happen. The movie tried to hide things and
tried to keep us guessing on who would end up with who. Who was looking for
whom? But, nah!
Don’t know why it took me this long to watch it, but I’m glad I finally
did. The plot is about a group of strangers in New York navigate love, hope,
and fresh starts as their lives intersect on New Year’s Eve. The movie follows
multiple storylines, each on their own course trying to sort out their lives,
and for each the significant timing is this New Year’s Eve.
The movie does boast of fantastic actors, who deliver good enough acting,
I liked the New Year vibe, but felt there were too many people in this movie,
you can feel the lack of character development ooze out at you, and there were
way too many cameos.
The movie is a Valentine’s Day lookalike and setup. Since both it and
Valentine’s Day were directed by Garry, he didn’t even bother to change much.
It was more like watching Valentine’s Day with a new cast and a new holiday,
although Valentine’s Day isn’t technically a holiday.
Garry has had his hands on some notable films in his days (he’s still
alive, mind you): Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride (both starred Julia
Roberts), and Valentine’s Day also had Julia as part of the ensemble
cast. I bet he still has more to dish out.
Having more than two dozen stars in one film, to me, is taking it too
far and shouldn’t be done often, but Garry did it twice back to back. I’m
hoping he won’t try that again, but it is box-office performance that speaks, and not my view.
Acting wise, when you have these much cast can be tough, and this movie had to face such issues as some actors did wonderful performances, and the less seasoned ones in this movie gave average to forgettable performances.
If you want to watch a movie with no real depth or story buildup — just a bunch of people running around and running into each other, all in the name of love, dreams, aspirations, and second chances, then I do advise you to see this.
If you need depth, suspense, thrill, then maybe you skip this one.
Oh my goodness, I am such a hopeless romantic and I love watching a good love story. I get butterflies in my stomach. I haven't watched New Years Eve yet but all my co-workers at Dish have told me I should watch it. They said it was a cute movie so I was pretty excited to find out it was available to rent on Blockbuster @Home. It arrived in the mail yesterday so this weekend I am planning on watching it, luckily I don't have to return it right away. I have read a few reviews disliking it but I still want to watch it. I'll let you know what I think about it.
ReplyDeleteWell am looking forward to hear your view.
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