By James David Patrick
The New Year’s Eve celebration rarely takes center stage in cinema. Compared to Christmas, it’s an also-ran, an afterthought. Some movies have set their sights on New Year’s Eve as a central theme, but let’s be honest, most of them come up wanting. The celebration of a new year has, however, provided wonderful scenes in classic film from the earliest days of the medium and in all kinds of genres. I’ve selected 10 films between 1925 and 2013, one for each decade, spanning every genre. Raquel Stecher wrote about some truly classic instances of cinematic New Year’s in this piece from a couple years ago. This is something totally different.
New Year’s might not compose a large portion of these films in minutes, but the following films have used the holiday to catalyze new character arcs or drive narrative momentum in unexpected directions. My list runs for 1,236 minutes, or 20.5 hours, which pretty much consumes the entire holiday with three hours and change reserved for snacking, naps and bathroom breaks. Roll over the drink cart and get super comfortable because we’re going to ring in the New Year with Charlie Chaplin, Bing Crosby, Gloria Swanson, Eddie Murphy, and Marky Mark. Sounds like a party to me.
The Gold Rush (Charlie Chaplin, 1925) - 112 minutes
Snow-choked and isolating, winter in the Yukon provided the ideal backdrop to depict the horrors of the Klondike Gold Rush and the Donner Party filtered through the comedy and pathos of Charlie Chaplin. Chaplin’s New Year’s Eve finds the Little Tramp eating his own shoe because he’s run out of food and pining after a woman named Georgia, who does worse than spurn his advances. This quintessential Chaplin dramedy mines the heartbreaking scenario for timeless slapstick set-pieces and earnest moments of nostalgic reflection.
Mystery of the Wax Museum (Michael Curtiz, 1933) - 77 minutes
The last film using the two-tone Technicolor process, Curtiz drapes this early horror film in warm reds and pinks. It’s the perfect color palette to highlight the film’s opening blaze and the manic energy of 1933 New York City on New Year’s Eve. Lionel Atwill gives an entertaining (mostly contained but still predictably hammy) performance as a sculptor who operates a failing London wax museum and becomes crippled and disfigured when the museum is accidentally set on fire. He relocates to New York City, re-opens his wax museum, and bodies start to go missing from the morgue. An ace reporter (Glenda Farrell) follows a killer story about a model’s suicide to the wax museum’s door. Remade as House of Wax starring Vincent Price in 1953.
Holiday Inn (Mark Sandrich, 1942) - 100 minutes
The inebriated and tuxedoed Fred Astaire staggers onto the dance floor and rings in the New Year with a showstopping dance number that makes fall-down drunk look ever so elegant. Holiday Inn stars Fred, Bing Crosby, Virginia Dale and Marjorie Reynolds, an original story from Irving Berlin, and the Academy Award winning appearance of “White Christmas.” While some of the performances provide a snapshot of 1942’s pre-enlightenment, the film’s premise of an entertainment venue that opens only on select holidays keeps you guessing about the next preposterous excuse for a musical number. Lincoln’s birthday has been wildly under-represented on film – and after watching Holiday Inn, you’ll know why.
Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) - 110 minutes
One of the most indelible scenes in a movie full of indelible scenes occurs on New Year’s Eve. Joe (William Holden) has slipped away from aging screen icon Norma Desmond’s mansion to find more age-appropriate company. In the bathroom of a raucous party, Joe and Betty (Nancy Olson) jokingly pretend to be melodramatic screen stars (a la Miss Desmond) and indirectly confess their affection for each other. It’s funny, perfectly acted, and sets in motion the destructive conflict that will dominate the final act of the film.
Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski, 1969) - 137 minutes
Though brief, the New Year’s scene in Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby marks a change in Rosemary’s mysterious demeanor. She confesses her unusually painful pregnancy to Ralph Bellamy’s condescending Dr. Sapirstein – after which Roman Castavet (Sydney Blackmer) celebrates the New Year with the darkly prophetic “To 1966! To Year One!” Smash cut to Rosemary eating a piece of raw meat and recognizing that something has gone terribly wrong with her pregnancy.
The Godfather: Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974) - 202 minutes
Maybe The Godfather: Part II doesn’t come to mind when you think of iconic New Year’s Eve scenes – but the scene in question deserves mention as perhaps the greatest individual scene from Coppola’s epic three-part Godfather saga.
Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) has assumed control of the Corleone mob family. Now in Havana scouting potential business, Michael’s also trying to sniff out the rat in his inner circle whose loose lips led to an attempted hit on his family. At the New Year’s Eve party, Michael hugs his brother Fredo close, grabs his head and plants the “kiss of death” on his lips. “I know it was you, Fredo. You broke my heart,” he says. This moment reveals the twist that his brother had wronged him, and that Michael intends to kill anyone who wrongs the family. It’s a stunning and heartbreaking turn of character signaling the transformation of Michael from anti-hero to villain.
Trading Places (John Landis, 1983) - 116 minutes
Now that we’ve had our fill of three consecutive films featuring New Year’s Eve scenes portending doom, we’ve reached the 1980s. It’s time to lighten the mood.
I might even consider Trading Places the ultimate holiday movie as it features scenes on Thanksgiving, Christmas and NYE. Drunk Dan Aykroyd Santa is unforgettable, but John Landis’ classic comedy ratchets up the absurdity for the New Year’s Eve train scene. Eddie Murphy plays a boisterous African named Mboko (“Merry New Year!”), Dan Aykroyd a Rastafarian (wearing blackface so intentionally terrible it seems entirely self-aware of its potential offense), Jamie Lee Curtis a busty Swede in lederhosen, and butler Denholm Elliott as a snockered priest. Within these impressively inept costumes their aim is to ruin the Duke brothers’ (Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche) commodities brokerage by swapping a report predicting a booming orange crop with a forgery that predicts low crop yields. You might need an investment manager to explain how their plan succeeds, but the manic pacing and non-stop, quippy dialogue speaks for itself.
Boogie Nights (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1997) – 155 minutes
Soundtracked by Charlie Wright and The Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band, P.T. Anderson’s exquisite 3-minute tracking shot follows Little Bill Thompson (William H. Macy) as he purposefully prowls a New Year’s Eve party looking for his porn star wife. He finds her having sex with another man. He returns to his car, retrieves his gun, and shoots them both before killing himself. Like many other New Year’s Eve scenes on this list, it represents a drastic tonal shift and predicts the characters’ forthcoming downward spiral. After living the carefree life of excess through the end of the 1970s, 1980 has arrived, marking the end of the Golden Age of Porn and the dawn of the VHS era.
About a Boy (Chris & Paul Weitz, 2002) – 101 minutes
New Year’s Eve wouldn’t be New Year’s Eve without the potential for a kiss that jumpstarts a relationship or wraps up a movie-long courtship. Until now this list has decidedly lacked romance, but it’s time to change all that. “On New Year’s Eve, I met Rachel. She was interesting and smart and attractive and for about five minutes I had her convinced that I was too.”
Will (Hugh Grant) and (Rachel) Rachel Weisz get to know each other over dinner and Will’s inner monologue fears that she’ll catch wind of his ambitionless lifestyle and flee into the night. When he feels her slipping away, he brings up his 12-year-old ersatz son (Nicholas Hoult) and Rachel immediately connects with him, believing he’s also a single parent. “I was in deep trouble and there was one person that could help me out,” he says as he and Rachel share a kiss that sets off their relationship and causes Will take his first real steps into adulthood. About a Boy is too often forgotten among the great movies of the Aughts and this New Year’s Eve connection should provide ample reason to watch (or rewatch) this charming and insightful romantic comedy.
Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-Ho, 2013) – 126 minutes
Bong Joon-Ho’s currently a buzzy name with Parasite collecting critical accolades, but a few years ago, the Korean director made this post-apocalyptic sci-fi thriller starring bearded Chris Evans and Tilda Swinton. Climate change has forced all of humanity to live on a moving train. The passengers celebrate New Year’s each time they circumnavigate the globe. The train cars have divided the important people from the undesirables until one passenger (Evans) decides to disrupt the caste system. The unforgettable premise gives birth to an equally unforgettable NYE celebration, thus satisfying this list’s sci-fi requirement.
James David Patrick is a Pittsburgh-based writer with a movie-watching problem. He has a degree in Film Studies from Emory University that gives him license to discuss Russian Shakespeare adaptations at cocktail parties. He hosts the Cinema Shame and #Bond_age_Pod podcasts. You’ll find him crate diving at local record shops. James blogs about movies, music and 80’s nostalgia at www.thirtyhertzrumble.com. Follow him on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.