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11 New Year’s Eve Movies to Watch Before Midnight

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11 New Year’s Eve Movies to Watch Before Midnight

The time between Christmas and New Year’s Eve can feel like a liminal space for a lot of reasons. One issue is figuring out what to watch: now that Christmas movies are off the schedule, what films will fill you with the holiday spirit?

The New Year’s movie is a more elusive genre compared to other holiday movies, with fewer films centered around the end of the year. But there are still some great choices that are about, or at least heavily feature, New Year’s celebrations that will get you in the mood before that countdown to midnight. Scroll on for our picks of the best movies to watch this New Year’s Eve.

RELATED: It’s the ‘For Auld Lang Syne’ Peanuts New Year’s Eve Special Trailer, Charlie Brown

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New Year’s Eve

Let’s start with the obvious. New Year’s Eve might not be Garry Marshall’s best film, nor the best movie on the list… but it is probably the most New Year’s Eve-y movie of all time. The film features several interconnected stories taking place in New York City before the ball drops in Times Square. New Year’s Eve does not remotely live up to the standard set by a similarly constructed holiday film (Love Actually), but it does boast a star-studded cast including Halle Berry, Robert De Niro, Zac Efron, Katherine Heigl, Ashton Kutcher, Sarah Jessica Parker, Michelle Pfeiffer, Hilary Swank, and Sofía Vergara, to name just a few.

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200 Cigarettes

200 Cigarettes is another group of separate New Year’s Eve tales that all come together, featuring a similarly impressive ensemble cast with Janeane Garofalo, Gaby Hoffmann, Kate Hudson, Courtney Love, Jay Mohr, Christina Ricci, Paul Rudd, and both Ben and Casey Affleck, among others. Set on NYE 1981, the characters are all making their way through New York City to a party thrown by Monica (Martha Plimpton) and having their own adventures on the journey – occasionally catching a ride from an eccentric cab driver played by Dave Chappelle.

High School Musical

High School Musical, of course, predominantly takes place during the school year. But it iconically kicks off at a New Year’s Party at a ski lodge where Troy (Zac Efron) and Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens) first meet. They discover their incredible chemistry when called up to perform karaoke to the Start of Something New – not only foreshadowing the teens’ future relationship but a good omen for any new year!


The Apartment

A key plot point in the “New Year’s” genre of films is the two lovers coming together on the final day of the year, as is the case in the 1960 movie, The Apartment. Jack Lemmon stars as “Bud” Baxter, a corporate drone who tries to get ahead by letting his company’s managers use his apartment to conduct affairs. Unfortunately for him, one of those managers is sleeping with the very woman Bud is interested in, Fran (Shirley MacLaine). Fran and her married man have their own romantic troubles, which allows love to blossom between her and Bud (under rather dramatic circumstances). Bud is able to restore his reputation and get the girl by New Year’s Eve! The comedy ended up winning multiple Academy Awards and became an all-time classic as a result (and inspired the Broadway hit musical Promises, Promises).


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Ocean’s Eleven (1960)

Ocean’s Eleven is to New Year’s what Die Hard is to Christmas: it’s not about the holiday, but that’s when the action takes place. The original 1960 version stars Rat Pack members Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, and Joey Bishop, a group of army buddies who plan a heist to hit five Las Vegas casinos simultaneously. The military-style strikes may be successful, but the gang runs into trouble when one of their own dies and ex-mobster Duke Santos (Cesar Romero) decides to look into the robberies. Not only is it festive for the season, but fans of Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s trilogy will also get a kick out of seeing where it all began.

Diner

Barry Levinson’s Diner is about a group of friends (played by Daniel Stern, Mickey Rourke, Paul Reiser, Kevin Bacon, and Timothy Daly) preparing for the 1959 New Year’s Eve wedding of their friend Eddie (Steve Guttenberg). In that awkward week between Christmas and New Year’s, the guys get into trouble and stir up their own relationship drama – and the wedding is nearly called off when Eddie’s fiancé fails his football quiz. All’s well that ends well, though, and Eddie manages to make it down the aisle with his friends by his side before the year ends.


Phantom Thread

Somewhat heavier fare than most other entries on this list, Phantom Thread is as gorgeous and meticulous as the creations of its lead character, Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis). A unique love story unfolds between Reynolds, a celebrated fashion designer, and Alma (Vicky Krieps), the woman who becomes his wife and muse. Critically acclaimed and hailed as one of Paul Thomas Anderson’s best works, this portrait of an artist also features a memorable New Year’s party for good measure.

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An American in Paris

Speaking of memorable New Year’s parties, An American in Paris may have the most memorable end-of-year soirée in classic cinema. The raucous black and white party takes place amidst the romance of Lise (Leslie Caron) and Jerry (Gene Kelly), the titular American artist studying in France. Attending the party with his patron (Nina Foch), Jerry runs into Lise and her fiancé (Georges Guétary). Heartbroken to say goodbye to his love, Jerry imagines a future for them in Paris… and let’s just say, dreams come true. And what better way to ring in the New Year than an all-time classic musical?


Four Rooms

Four Rooms is an interesting experiment, a collaboration amongst filmmakers Allison Anders, Alexandre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez, and Quentin Tarantino. The story follows a bellhop named Ted (Tim Roth) at the Hotel Mon Signor on his first night, which happens to be New Year’s Eve. He attends to four different rooms, encountering the unruly guests and wild happenings behind each door. These vignettes are each written and directed by one of the four filmmakers, with the added bonus of Tarantino starring as a famous director in the final installment.

Bridget Jones’s Diary

Bridget Jones’s Diary begins on January 1 with the titular heroine (played by Renée Zellweger) writing down her New Year’s resolutions. What follows is a Pride and Prejudice retelling for the modern era with an endlessly relatable protagonist. Caught between her womanizing boss Daniel (Hugh Grant) and the uptight Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), Bridget has a year of adventures, mishaps, and growth that lead her right into the arms of her true love.


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When Harry Met Sally…

Not only is When Harry Met Sally… one of the best romantic comedies of all time, it probably has the best “lovers reunite at a New Year’s Eve bash” scene ever. Written by the icon Nora Ephron and directed by Rob Reiner, the movie follows Harry (Billy Crystal) and Sally (Meg Ryan) as they try to determine whether men and women can ever be “just friends.” As the duo meet again and again over the years, their sparkling chemistry growing affection for one another leads to an enduring friendship that tests the limits of that central question. Auld Lang Syne has been used to cap off many a holiday film, but never better than the moment after the clock strikes midnight at the New Year’s party and Sally reminds us “it’s about old friends.”


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Review: SAMARITAN, A Sly Stallone Superhero Stumble

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Review: SAMARITAN, A Sly Stallone Superhero Stumble

Hitting the three-quarter-century mark usually means a retirement home, a nursing facility, or if you’re lucky to be blessed with relatively good health and savings to match, living in a gated community in Arizona or Florida.

For Sylvester Stallone, however, it means something else entirely: starring in the first superhero-centered film of his decades-long career in the much-delayed Samaritan. Unfortunately for Stallone and the audience on the other side of the screen, the derivative, turgid, forgettable results won’t get mentioned in a career retrospective, let alone among the ever-expanding list of must-see entries in a genre already well past its peak.

For Stallone, however, it’s better late than never when it involves the superhero genre. Maybe in getting a taste of the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) with his walk-on role in the Guardians of the Galaxy sequel several years ago, Stallone thought anything Marvel can do, I can do even better (or just as good in the nebulous definition of the word).

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The property Stallone and his team found for him, Samaritan, a little-known graphic novel released by a small, almost negligible, publisher, certainly takes advantage of Stallone’s brute-force physicality and his often underrated talent for near-monosyllabic brooding (e.g., the Rambo series), but too often gives him to little do or say as the lone super-powered survivor, the so-called “Samaritan” of the title, of a lifelong rivalry with his brother, “Nemesis.” Two brothers entered a fire-ravaged building and while both were presumed dead, one brother did survive (Stallone’s Joe Smith, a garbageman by day, an appliance repairman by night).

In the Granite City of screenwriter Bragi F. Schut (Escape Room, Season of the Witch), the United States, and presumably the rest of the world, teeters on economic and political collapse, with a recession spiraling into a depression, steady gigs difficult, if not impossible, to obtain, and the city’s neighborhoods rocked by crime and violence. No one’s safe, not even 13-year-old Sam (Javon Walker), Joe’s neighbor.

When he’s not dodging bullies connected to a gang, he’s falling under the undue influence of Cyrus (Pilou Asbæk), a low-rent gang leader with an outsized ego and the conviction that he and only he can take on Nemesis’s mantle and along with that mantle, a hammer “forged in hate,” to orchestrate a Bane-like plan to plunge the city into chaos and become a wealthy power-broker in the process.

Schut’s woefully underwritten script takes a clumsy, haphazard approach to world-building, relying on a two-minute animated sequence to open Samaritan while a naive, worshipful Sam narrates Samaritan and Nemesis’s supposedly tragic, Cain and Abel-inspired backstory. Schut and director Julius Avery (Overlord) clumsily attempt to contrast Sam’s childish belief in messiah-like, superheroic saviors stepping in to save humanity from itself and its own worst excesses, but following that path leads to authoritarianism and fascism (ideas better, more thoroughly explored in Watchmen and The Boys).

While Sam continues to think otherwise, Stallone’s superhero, 25 years past his last, fatal encounter with his presumably deceased brother, obviously believes superheroes are the problem and not the solution (a somewhat reasonable position), but as Samaritan tracks Joe and Sam’s friendship, Sam giving Joe the son he never had, Joe giving Sam the father he lost to street violence well before the film’s opening scene, it gets closer and closer to embracing, if not outright endorsing Sam’s power fantasies, right through a literally and figuratively explosive ending. Might, as always, wins regardless of how righteous or justified the underlying action.

It’s what superhero audiences want, apparently, and what Samaritan uncritically delivers via a woefully under-rendered finale involving not just unconvincing CGI fire effects, but a videogame cut-scene quality Stallone in a late-film flashback sequence that’s meant to be subversively revelatory, but will instead lead to unintentional laughter for anyone who’s managed to sit the entirety of Samaritan’s one-hour and 40-minute running time.

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Samaritan is now streaming worldwide on Prime Video.

Samaritan

Cast
  • Sylvester Stallone
  • Javon ‘Wanna’ Walton
  • Pilou Asbæk

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Matt Shakman Is In Talks To Direct ‘Fantastic Four’

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According to a new report, Wandavision’s Matt Shakman is in talks to direct the upcoming MCU project, Fantastic Four. Marvel Studios has been very hush-hush regarding Fantastic Four to the point where no official announcements have been made other than the film’s release date. No casting news or literally anything other than rumors has been released regarding the project. We know that Fantastic Four is slated for release on November 8th, 2024, and will be a part of Marvel’s Phase 6. There are also rumors that the cast of the new Fantastic Four will be announced at the D23 Expo on September 9th.

Fantastic Four is still over two years from release, and we assume we will hear more news about the project in the coming months. However, the idea of the Fantastic Four has already been introduced into the MCU. John Krasinski played Reed Richards aka Mr. Fantastic in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. The cameo was a huge deal for fans who have been waiting a long time for the Fantastic Four to enter the MCU. When Disney acquired Twenty Century Fox in 2019 we assumed that the Fox Marvel characters would eventually make their way into the MCU. It’s been 3 years and we already have had an X-Men and Fantastic Four cameo – even if they were from another universe.

Deadline is reporting that Wandavision’s Matt Shakman is in talks to direct Fantastic Four. Shakman served as the director for Wandavision and has had an extensive career. He directed two episodes of Game of Thrones and an episode of The Boys, and he had a long stint on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. There is nothing official yet, but Deadline’s sources say that Shakman is currently in talks for the job and things are headed in the right direction.

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To be honest, I was a bit more excited when Jon Watts was set to direct. I’m sure Shakman is a good director, but Watts proved he could handle a tentpole superhero film with Spider-Man: Homecoming. Wandavision was good, but Watts’ style would have been perfect for Fantastic Four. The film is probably one of the most anticipated films in Marvel’s upcoming slate films and they need to find the best person they can to direct. Is that Matt Shakman? It could be, but whoever takes the job must realize that Marvel has a lot riding on this movie. The other Fantastic Four films were awful and fans deserve better. Hopefully, Marvel knocks it out of the park as they usually do. You can see for yourself when Fantastic Four hits theaters on November 8th, 2024.

Film Synopsis: One of Marvel’s most iconic families makes it to the big screen: the Fantastic Four.

Source: Deadline

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Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase Star in ‘Zombie Town’ Mystery Teen Romancer (Exclusive)

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Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase have entered Zombie Town, a mystery teen romancer based on author R.L. Stine’s book of the same name.

The indie, now shooting in Ontario, also stars Henry Czerny and co-teen leads Marlon Kazadi and Madi Monroe. The ensemble cast includes Scott Thompson and Bruce McCulloch of the Canadian comedy show Kids in the Hall.

Canadian animator Peter Lepeniotis will direct Zombie Town. Stine’s kid’s book sees a quiet town upended when 12-year-old Mike and his friend, Karen, see a horror movie called Zombie Town and unexpectedly see the title characters leap off the screen and chase them through the theater.

Zombie Town will premiere in U.S. theaters before streaming on Hulu and then ABC Australia in 2023.

“We are delighted to bring the pages of R.L. Stine’s Zombie Town to the screen and equally thrilled to be working with such an exceptional cast and crew on this production. A three-time Nickelodeon Kids Choice Award winner with book sales of over $500 million, R.L. Stine has a phenomenal track record of crafting stories that engage and entertain audiences,” John Gillespie, Trimuse Entertainment founder and executive producer, said in a statement.

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Executive producers are Trimuse Entertainment, Toonz Media Group, Lookout Entertainment, Viva Pictures and Sons of Anarchy actor Kim Coates.  

Paco Alvarez and Mark Holdom of Trimuse negotiated the deal to acquire the rights to Stine’s Zombie Town book.

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