New Year’s Eve (The One Where Hilary Swank Drops the Ball)

This week on The Worst Movie Podcast, Ade and Aaron ring in the new year with New Year’s Eve (2011) — the bloated, celebrity-packed rom-com that treats Times Square like a narrative dumping ground. Directed by Gary Marshall and stuffed with more recognizable faces than an Oscars montage, the film juggles dozens of half-baked story lines involving dying wishes, stalled elevators, maternity ward competitions, and a fragile New Year’s Eve ball.

So grab your champagne, set your expectations low, and join Ade and Aaron as they slog through paper-thin characters, relentless exposition, and a holiday movie that somehow makes optimism feel exhausting. Because if New Year’s Eve taught us anything, it’s that stuffing a movie with stars doesn’t guarantee fireworks — sometimes it just guarantees a very long countdown.

Watch the trailer for New Year's Eve.

Transcript

Ade (00:00)
Hello and welcome to the Worst Movie Podcast. I'm Ade

Aaron (00:03)
And I'm Aaron and this is a podcast where we watch the worst movies ever made in the hopes of finding a hidden gem.

Ade (00:10)
Enjoy!

Happy New Year!

Aaron (00:23)
Happy New Year. Have you been watching anything lately?

Ade (00:27)
Yeah, I've been rewatching Mad Men finally. It's on HBO now, so you don't have to buy AMC+. So I jumped on that. I'm only two episodes in though, I'm not you. I'm going through it pretty slowly, but yeah, it's awesome.

Aaron (00:36)
Peace.

Thanks.

I don't think I finished that series. Yeah.

Ade (00:51)
Really? Where do

you think you dropped off?

Aaron (00:54)
I remember him living in an apartment with another woman.

Ade (00:59)
Okay.

I don't think I remember beat by beat to tell you what season that is, but that feels like maybe, yeah, halfway through. ⁓

Aaron (01:00)
Possibly.

What the later season? How many seasons

are there?

Ade (01:11)
Good question. I want to say five. You want to fact check me alive? I was surprised. I watched the first episode and I was surprised by how much happened in that first episode. I think I kind of smushed the whole story together.

Aaron (01:16)
I'll see.

There are seven seasons and I think that I dropped off somewhere in the like season or around there.

Ade (01:28)
Seven, wow, that's way off.

Okay, well, it might take me seven years to rewatch it, but.

Aaron (01:44)
The rest of 2026.

Ade (01:47)
Yeah, at least.

should we talk about today's movie? New Year's Eve. Yes, we must. ⁓ it's a little awkward because this is airing Christmas week. So also Merry Christmas, but we already did our two Christmas movies and then we're going to do our New Year's movie and then probably take next week off. so New Year's Eve.

Aaron (01:51)
If we must.

Yeah.

Ade (02:09)
from 2011 directed by Gary Marshall who did Pretty Woman, League of Their Own and.

Aaron (02:16)
Penny

Marshall's brother.

Ade (02:18)
I did not know that Penny Marshall is in the movie. it stars, let's come back to that because there are, I think I counted 22, actors that I think any casual moviegoer would know the name of. and I will rattle through them in a bit, rapid fire, but

Aaron (02:36)
Yeah.

Ade (02:42)
This movie got a 7 % on Rotten Tomatoes and $56 million budget, 142 million in box office. So it was commercially successful, but people hated it. So had you heard of this movie? Did you know anything about it?

Aaron (02:58)
Nope, I wish I still didn't know anything about it.

Ade (03:02)
Spoiler alert, you did not like the movie. ⁓

Aaron (03:05)
Yeah,

I don't think that's going to surprise anyone.

Ade (03:08)
Yeah, this was part of an unofficial trilogy of Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, and then New Year's Eve. They're not related, they were made by the same people, but have you seen Valentine's Day or Mother's Day?

Aaron (03:20)
I didn't know they existed. Which is like, so this director has done more than that. He did the Princess Diaries. He did Runaway Bride. He did Pretty Woman. Beaches. Like, he's a well-known director. This trilogy slipped right by me, I guess.

Ade (03:40)
I kind of remember Valentine's Day. don't know if I watched it, I think these were loosely on my radar, not really speaking to me.

Aaron (03:46)
Yeah.

Ade (03:46)
well, it's going to be a hard movie to cover. Do you want to give the synopsis real quick?

Aaron (03:51)
Yeah, I'm going to keep it short and sweet because there's a lot going on in this movie. So the synopsis is the lives of several couples and singles in New York City intertwine over the course of New Year's Eve.

Ade (04:04)
Yeah, so it's one of those movies where there are just a lot of storylines happening and everyone's kind of loosely related to each other. Let me rattle off the list of stars and I'm gonna, I'm actually skipping some on this list. I'll see if I can do this in like 10 seconds or less. Michelle Pfeiffer, Zac Efron, Robert De Niro, Holly Berry, Carrie Elwes, Alyssa Milano, Common, Jessica Biel, Seth Meyers, Sarah Paulson,

Aaron (04:25)
I'm ready.

Ade (04:33)
Karla Gugino, Katherine Heigl, John Bon Jovi, Sophia Vergara, Ashton Kutcher, Jim Belushi, Sarah Jessica Parker, Josh DeHamel, Penny Marshall, Hilary Swank, Ludacris, Ryan Seacrest, Matthew Broderick, and John Lithgow. Did I?

Aaron (04:48)
And yardly

Smith. And did you get Leah Michelle?

Ade (04:52)
No, is that the singer? I just kept it to, okay, I didn't know who she was. So I just kept it to like famous, like widely known people. That's obviously subjective, but like I said, I thought I would leave some people out. So these are all instantly recognizable people.

Aaron (04:54)
Yes, she's from Glee.

Yeah.

Russell Peters, isn't it? He's a big comedian.

Ade (05:15)
Yeah, I didn't know if people would know who he was.

Aaron (05:18)
I say Yardley Smith is in it? Is her second appearance on our podcast after Maximum Overdrive?

Ade (05:23)
⁓ You did say that. Who does she play in this?

Aaron (05:27)
She plays the woman in the RV. Her character's name is Maude. ⁓ When Josh Duhamel's character is trying to get to New York City after his car breaks down, she's part of that family that takes him to New York City.

Ade (05:35)
⁓ right. yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah,

and Maxim over overdrive. was obviously the bride.

Aaron (05:49)
Yes.

Ade (05:50)
Yeah, several repeat, Matthew Broderick in this.

Jim Belushi also.

Aaron (05:57)
Yeah,

he was in last week's or no two weeks ago. He was in jingle all the way.

Ade (06:01)
Yeah, it's all a blur.

Yeah. So, uh, again, the whole thing, the whole movie is about New Year's Eve. How do you feel about New Year's Eve as a holiday in general?

Aaron (06:11)
This movie made me roll my eyes the entire time because New Year's Eve means almost nothing to me. And for like these people, it's the most important day of the year. It's the one day the whole world comes together to celebrate optimism in the new year. I was like, I don't know. I'm asleep.

Ade (06:16)
Hahaha

Yeah.

What do you usually sleep under your seat?

Aaron (06:33)
If I'm awake, we usually will like try to find a live countdown, but it is not important for me to be awake and I'm generally asleep or doing something else.

Ade (06:46)
here in New Year's Eve Grinch. like.

Aaron (06:49)
I'm not even like a Grinch. It's not like I hate New Year's Eve or I don't want other people to enjoy it. I just don't care about it. What about you? Are you a big New Year's Eve guy?

Ade (06:58)
I'm a New Year's Eve optimist in that I think it would be my favorite holiday. Like I love the idea of New Year's Eve and having a giant party and celebrating the previous year and looking forward to the next year. And like it's a reset and it's just this, yeah, it's this big celebration. But I would say most of my New Year's Eve's fall way short of that. ⁓

Aaron (07:22)
you

Ade (07:23)
And so it's just like every year I'm like, New Year's Eve, I get excited for it. And then it's just disappointment because it's never, it's never that giant party. I mean, I've had been to a few New Year's Eve parties and they've been great, but most New Year's Eve it's like, ⁓ it's a bit of a dud.

Aaron (07:42)
Do you want to host a New Year's Eve party or just attend one?

Ade (07:45)
I have done both. and attending is way easier than hosting for sure. Hosting there's so much pressure

Aaron (07:52)
What's your favorite New Year's Eve that you've had in your life so far?

Ade (07:56)
Kelly and I went to Vegas one New Year's Eve and that stance jumps to mind. It was kind of a New Year's Eve slash, anniversary trip. And so we had some nice dinners. it probably the first time we had a great, like high end prefix dinner and it was amazing. and then we saw fireworks on the strip at midnight.

Aaron (07:59)
Mmm.

Ade (08:20)
And it was just, you know, packed with people, and gorgeous, beautiful. And yeah, that was a lot of fun. That may be, I mean, that's, that's definitely up there. Top three. if, if not top, how about you?

Aaron (08:31)
I've I think that I've only had really two memorable New Year's and the first one was y2k ⁓ Which was like I was 13 so it wasn't like I did anything crazy, but it was just memorable and then It must have been 2011 when this movie came out We had just moved to California and I

Ade (08:42)
Yeah.

Aaron (08:54)
Ran into a coworker from Indiana that I had worked with and they were just in town in Oakland and we met up at a bar and hung out and talked about our lives and stuff and then went next door. They had a big party going on next door at the bar and watched the ball drop and everybody was dancing and it was pretty memorable. It was exciting. That is fun. I didn't need I didn't need New Year's though to.

Ade (09:16)
Yeah, see those are fun. Yeah, my what?

Aaron (09:22)
to be the catalyst for hanging out with an old coworker.

Ade (09:26)
I mean sure, yeah. mean if you could just have a fun party with a bunch of people on random night, like that works too.

Aaron (09:33)
Yeah, that would have been memorable whether it was New Year's or not.

Ade (09:36)
My Y2K was probably my worst New Year's Eve or one of them because I had planned a party and I was in college at the time. And then like last minute, all these people canceled because they didn't want to, I can't remember if there's weather or something like that. They didn't want to drive in because everybody had gotten home for the Christmas break. And then me and a few people just kind of like walked around campus and ended up watching, leaving Las Vegas.

Aaron (09:42)
Why?

Ade (10:04)
On New Year's Eve, which I love that movie, but you know, couldn't get farther from the spirit of celebration and joy than watching Nicholas Cage drink himself to death.

Aaron (10:05)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Not what you planned.

Nobody wanted to be away from home when the apocalypse started.

Ade (10:21)
Yeah, I think that probably

had a small part to do with it. So

All right, let's move on to the movie.

without covering every single character and storyline in this, like tell me who is the worst character in this? And then I'm gonna ask you who's the least worst character, but let's start with who is the worst character, who annoyed you the most?

Aaron (10:40)
I think that Leah Michelle annoyed me the most. Her plot line was she was stuck in an elevator with Ashton Kutcher on New Year's Eve and he hates New Year's Eve and she loves it maybe. I don't know. She's a backup singer for Bon Jovi's character and she's trying to get to the concert that he's having, but she's stuck in an elevator with Ashton Kutcher and

Ade (11:06)
Ahem.

Aaron (11:06)
I hated it. It was cheesy. I thought he was fine, but when she breaks out into song midway through, I was like, fuck my life. So they, there's this scene when she's stuck in the elevator where she's having a duet with Bon Jovi singing, have a little faith in me, which is a great song that they ruined.

Ade (11:11)
Ha ha.

Hahaha!

Aaron (11:31)
And also she's not with Bon Jovi when she's having this duet. She's just like staring at the moon out the window and having it. And I think that that scene took years off my life.

Ade (11:43)
Yeah, why did it annoy you so much?

Aaron (11:47)
I hated the idea of them singing together but apart and like having this shared moment. And also they ruined the song. I hated it. It was, one of my favorite songs and it sounded horrible.

Ade (12:00)
She's a great singer. didn't think she's talented.

Aaron (12:03)
She is a

great singer and I like Bon Jovi. I like them separately, but the, the take that they had on that beloved song for me was terrible. I hated it. It didn't sound good at all.

Ade (12:17)
since we're talking about her as a character. did have some burning questions that I wrote down about her. Why was she going to work so early? She gets stuck in the elevator like six hours before, actually more than that, before she has to be on stage and she's in a hurry then and panicked.

Aaron (12:26)
Hours before.

Yeah.

And despite

being stuck in the elevator all day, she still makes it to the show on time.

Ade (12:40)
Yeah, it didn't make any sense. ⁓ Also, will, maybe we'll get to this, but Jensen kind of the John Bon Jovi's character quits as the performer for new. Yeah, he's, he's the one who's supposed to sing on Times Square. And then as the backup singer, she does the main song. Would they actually just let the backup singer perform?

Aaron (12:43)
Yeah.

Mid concert.

I have no idea, I guess. Like what else are your, what other options do you have? Just tell everyone to go home.

Ade (13:11)
I don't know how those things work.

I mean, maybe just play a song. Like, don't they just play that song each year? I don't remember somebody singing it and putting their own spin on the, what is that song? Old Lang Syne or what? I don't know how to say it. I don't think it's like the national anthem where everybody gets to like remix it. I think they just play it from tape.

Aaron (13:19)
That's probably true.

Yeah, something like that.

Yeah, that would have been better. Honestly, yeah, her performance was fine when she sang that. Like her doing her own thing was fine. I didn't like her her duets with John Bon Jovi. They don't have voices that pair together well. I don't know what they thought. I don't know. I don't know what they were thinking when they cast this.

Ade (13:59)
Yeah, it's hard to, it's hard to pick which characters are the worst. I, I think Hillary Swank's character is my least favorite because she's in charge of the ball drop and she's just a hot, yeah, she's the VP and, and she's just a hot mess from the start and nervous about things. She's afraid of heights and an employee has to carry her to the top.

Aaron (14:09)
Mmm.

The Times Square Alliance.

Yeah.

Ade (14:30)
Which I did laugh out loud when that happened. And then another woman was said, are we all getting picked up? And this other guy started to pick that other woman up. And then somebody was like, no, no, but it was just like, yeah, I mean, it was a small like half second chuckle, but I didn't understand how she got the job. is, this is, I don't know what she does the rest of the year, but this is the most important.

Aaron (14:31)
Yeah.

Yeah, I rolled my eyes.

Yeah.

Ade (14:59)
presumably the most important part of her job, if not the only part of her job, and then she leaves halfway through.

Aaron (15:06)
Yeah. So I looked it up. The Times Square Alliance is a real thing and their job is promoting Times Square. So I don't know what that involves. Yeah, selling ads maybe and like trying to get it into the social conscience, I guess, ⁓ consciousness, but I don't know what they do. I didn't like her character either.

Ade (15:16)
Okay, so she does other things.

But

she just does a lot of weird stuff. Like, so the ball gets stuck on the way up and then she gives a speech that's just all bullshit. She lies. She's like, we, the ball stopping midway is a reflection of how we all need to pause and think about, I don't know. I stopped listening to the speech, but everybody in New York city and around the world, presumably are glued to their television. Yeah.

Aaron (15:36)
Yeah. ⁓

Yeah.

It's tuned in. Yeah.

Ade (15:55)
At

six o'clock in the, because that's just what we all do on New Year's Eve. We just constantly watch the New York Times broadcast or the Times Square broadcast. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Uh, and like people are like tearing up and like, oh, it's so heartfelt. And it's like, why lie to them? Just be like the ball got stuck. We're trying to fix it. Like everybody knows.

Aaron (16:03)
We're all dying to hear from the vice president of the Times Square Alliance.

technical difficulties

we're still hours away from the ball drop we'll have it fixed on time

Ade (16:22)
They see technicians scrambling up there. mean, it's not like you can hide that. And then just weird stuff in that storyline. Like at the end, she leaves and then Ludacris's family comes to his work too. Like she had... I didn't...

Aaron (16:35)
Yeah. What was her relationship to Ludacris? He was a

lieutenant in the NYPD, and I thought that they were together until Ludacris's family showed up.

Ade (16:46)
Yeah, I mean there were some weird like they must have cut a lot out of this movie because it seemed like they had some deep connections. I don't know how. But yeah, and yeah, why did his family show up?

Aaron (16:54)
Yeah.

I don't know. So this movie is an hour and 57 minutes long. And we didn't even see his family until like an hour 40 minutes in. And I'm like, who the fuck are these people? You're introducing new characters?

Ade (17:12)
Yeah, there are so many characters in this movie. mean, we're 20 minutes into the movie and they're still introducing like quote unquote main characters. And I think, yeah, and I think this is the main problem with the movie. If you would have just picked two of those storylines and went deep on them, it could have made a lot more sense and you could have, I could have developed an emotional attachment to these characters. But by the end, I didn't care about anybody at all. Yeah.

Aaron (17:21)
Yeah, like big stars.

Yeah.

No, no.

I hated it. ⁓ My second, my first note is an hour and 57 minutes. So like with question marks and exclamation points. And then my second note was if you're going to make a dog shit movie, at least have the decency to make it short. Jingle all the way knew they were making trash and they made it mercifully short.

Ade (17:51)
Yeah.

Yeah. Now this-

this one, seems like, I mean, they made money. Their strategy seemed to be let's stuff as many celebrities into this as possible. And they all want their own share of screen time. So let's just do that. And people will show up because they're like, ⁓ I want to see, you know, fill in the blank on screen.

Aaron (18:24)
Yeah, my runner up worst character was definitely Zac Efron. ⁓

Ade (18:32)
He was,

I put him down for my least worst. I mean, all right. You, you, you talk and then I'll, I'll respond.

Aaron (18:36)
What?

So to introduce his character, he is a courier, like a delivery person that is delivering packages to Michelle Pfeiffer's character, who is a secretary or an assistant for John Lithgow, who was only in the movie for like 30 seconds. ⁓

Ade (18:49)
Yeah.

who is obsessed

with angry birds apparently.

Aaron (19:03)
Yeah, that's

another this movie is so dated. It's so 2011. It's painful. Yeah, he's obsessed with Angry Birds. They're talking about like saving minutes on their cell phone plans and they've got like this clunky stick on GPS in their car that is a horrible. Yeah, it's just all very dated.

Ade (19:07)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Somebody says, like Facebook, but real. was like, the people who wrote this had just discovered Facebook.

Aaron (19:37)
Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. There's like a there's an eagerness and an enthusiasm to this movie that just made me want to throw up. ⁓ But he's a he's a courier. He's delivering a package to Michelle Pfeiffer, who is basically she quits her job in this scene because she hates John Lithgow. But he delivers these passes to her for this a hern.

Ade (19:48)
You

Aaron (20:05)
⁓ records party that's going on for New Year's Eve. And he stays and watches her open it, which I thought was weird and comments on what she has in her package, which totally inappropriate if you're like a delivery person to stand there and watch them open it.

Ade (20:23)
I mean,

before he delivers the package, he's going through the office and like grabbing a bunch of candy and like, think he makes himself coffee and stuff like, yeah. I I don't know. He's taking it. He's a hustler. He's, know.

Aaron (20:33)
Like he works there.

Yeah, he's best friends, possibly roommates with Ashton Kutcher. Just friends and he's the bro-iest dude ever. It's like, I don't know. He's high-fiving people and sweet talking the girls on the street and he thinks he's the coolest man there ever was.

Ade (20:45)
I think they're just friends.

I mean, he is the coolest

man in this movie.

Aaron (21:02)
I don't know, Luda was pretty cool. He didn't give a shit at all the whole time and I was like, I feel that.

Ade (21:08)
No, I didn't know what Ludo

was, mean, Common was the coolest man in this movie, I think. No, I, look, it's hard to pick favorite character out of this list of characters because like I said, I didn't care about anybody and I didn't.

Aaron (21:13)
That's true.

I don't

think it's hard at all to pick favorite character.

Ade (21:25)
Really, who's your favorite character?

Aaron (21:27)
Robert De Niro.

Ade (21:29)
my gosh, I thought that character was, the whole character thing is he's laying in his deathbed and he just wants to hang on to watch the ball drop one more time. It's like, who cares about the ball drop that much? Like that's your thing.

Aaron (21:42)
I don't know.

I did think that like who gives a shit about New Year's that much, but everybody in this movie apparently does.

Ade (21:50)
That's his entire, like he has no personality or storyline or like they gave him nothing other than he wants to hang on to watch the ball drop.

Aaron (21:59)
Yeah, but he had

this backstory about how he's ruined every relationship in his life up to this point, and there's no one there for him. The only thing that he wants is to see the new year and die.

Ade (22:05)
a letter.

I felt like they tried to make his character deep, it was just like, okay, this is textbook old man on his deathbed speech.

Aaron (22:18)
I mean, none of these characters were deep. Like, I'm not going to hold that against him that...

Ade (22:21)
Yeah.

I don't hold it against

him personally. I don't hold against any of the actors in this movie. They got their paycheck.

Aaron (22:29)
Yeah,

to me, he had the most like straightforward, easy to comprehend plot line. It's like he's going to die. He's not getting treatment. He doesn't give a shit. He's alone. He just wants to see the ball drop and kick the bucket. And I was like, I could see that the rest of this. I'm like, no, none of this happens to anybody.

Ade (22:37)
sure.

What, since we're talking about storylines, what's your least favorite storyline then?

Aaron (23:00)
Probably.

God, it's hard to pick. ⁓ I think probably the maternity ward storyline. So this was Seth Meyers played a character Griffin and his wife Tess played by Jessica Beale. And they're at the hospital on New Year's Eve trying to win money because if you have the first baby in the new year,

Ade (23:04)
Hahaha

yeah, I was, yeah.

Aaron (23:26)
at that hospital you get 25,000 bucks and they're competing with another couple to try to have their baby first or at the right time, I guess. And, ⁓

Ade (23:35)
Yeah. Which

the whole contest, think apparently is just settled by what time you say you had the baby.

Aaron (23:42)
You say,

I was like, yeah. Yeah. So, so Seth Meyers and Jessica Beale win the, the competition, but they've become close with this other couple that they're competing with. And so they just say, ⁓ ours was born second. I'm like, well, there's still like records. The hospital has the records.

Ade (23:45)
Like that seems easier.

Yeah, it's actually not even, it wasn't even clear to me that they were close with that couple or why they ceded the money. He still has student loans. There are so many plot points too. he fails to get a cab, like somebody steals the cab from him and he's like, I got this. And then they take a petty cab to the hospital. Like, why not just wait a few more minutes for a cab?

Aaron (24:12)
I know.

Yeah, I know. I was like,

how long did they wait not getting cabs before they decided to take the petty cab?

Ade (24:34)
Yeah, that's gonna be way slower for sure.

Aaron (24:36)
Yeah.

And they're like, pedal faster. He's like, this is as fast as I go.

Ade (24:41)
Yeah, I mean, I don't know if it was supposed to be funny. probably the storyline I cared about the least was Josh Duhamel's character. don't know how to say his last name. I tried researching it before and couldn't find a good anyway, Josh D and Sarah Jessica Parker. First of all, just his storyline in general, he crashes his car because

Aaron (24:49)
I think it's Duh-Mel. Duh-Mel.

Ade (25:03)
He's like trying to fuddle with his GPS while he's driving to figure out how to get back to New York City. And he crashes into what looks like a highway sign. Like just look at the sign anyway. And then it's this whole thing about him trying to get back to give this big speech for work. And his speech is like three sentences. It's this whole buildup. And then there's a storyline of like last year I met this woman.

Aaron (25:12)
Yeah.

You

Ade (25:29)
And she said, if you're really serious, meet me at this time next year on New Year's Eve at this place. And for, I don't know, that's just a, if anybody did that in real life, it'd be like, what the fuck? Just give me your number. Like why, why do I have to wait a year? Yeah, exactly. Like are, are, are we exclusive? Like, are you saying, like what, what is waiting a year mean? Uh, but.

Aaron (25:34)
this place.

We're adults.

You gotta really

want her.

Ade (25:58)
Exactly. And like, it wasn't clear from the story that he told how long he had spent with her. Was it only like 15 minutes or like a couple hours?

Aaron (26:08)
Yeah, it was less than a night, I think.

Ade (26:12)
But it must be true love, I guess anyway, because they, the the clock.

Aaron (26:15)
According to Wikipedia,

it says that they fell in love and I was like, okay, they just met.

Ade (26:20)
I guess so. ⁓

And then the climax of the movie, which I guess we're supposed to feel really emotional about is the big reveal that it's Sarah Jessica Parker's character that, and by that point, first of all, I didn't care. was like, I don't care who this woman is. And then I was kind of like, who's left for this to be? then I was like, yeah. And then I was like, her? I don't know.

Aaron (26:39)
Yeah.

They teased Hillary swank.

Egg?

Ade (26:48)
Why?

They didn't seem compatible at all. Their characters and her whole storyline is her freaking out because her teenage daughter wants to go watch the ball drop. And yeah. And it's like, okay, just yeah. Or just be mad at her and ground her when she gets back. I don't know. She's.

Aaron (27:02)
with our friends.

Let her go.

Ade (27:12)
running all around New York City trying to find her and that seems impossible knowing that there are millions of people out and about.

Aaron (27:18)
Yeah, my understanding

of Times Square on New Year's Eve is that it's like gridlock of humans. People stand there and like go to the bathroom and diapers because you can't get in and out. Like you're you're not running through there looking for your daughter. You're in a mass of human bodies.

Ade (27:31)
Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, I think I know the answer to this, but do you have any interest of seeing the ball drop live?

Aaron (27:45)
light. It seems like one of those things like maybe once in your life you see it happen. But like there are so many other things that I would rather see happen first that I'm not sure that I'll ever do it.

Ade (27:47)
Yeah.

Yeah.

I think it'd be really cool if it wasn't for the whole. Stating around in diapers and having to be there 10 hours ahead of time or however long just to get a viewing position. Like if you could get, if there was a VIP area and I could get in the maybe, but speaking of which, maybe if I show up next year and I say I'm the drummer for.

Aaron (28:04)
You

Yeah.

⁓ for this famous rock band, Jensen.

Ade (28:28)
Yeah, and I'm just in my pajamas like Ashton Kutcher was. I can get into not only the VIP area, but the backstage area. I did have the thought like this seems to happen so much in movies where people just show up and like, hey, I'm the... It happened in Jingle All the Way where he just managed to be in the parade because he walked through the right door. Yeah, yeah. Maybe I should be trying that more.

Aaron (28:32)
Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm Turbo Man.

I think that it probably works more often than you think. Like I've seen these videos. ⁓ I don't know if you'd call it social engineering or whatever, where people just put on a vest or something and try to get into events, you know, like a security vest or a worker thing or like road construction or something. And you'd be surprised how far you can get. I saw a video where a guy got into a concert. it was like a, it wasn't a concert, but it was like, ⁓

Ade (29:10)
Yeah.

Aaron (29:25)
was almost like a Disney on ice type thing. And he got on the ice like down without a ticket before he got thrown out. I'm like, I guess you maybe can do this kind of stuff.

Ade (29:31)
Hahaha

Yeah.

All right, well, ball drop 2027, I guess, or there. By the way, do know that one square building where the ball drops from is actually empty all year? It's not leased out. It's just, they make all their revenue from the ads on the side and the whole ball drop spectacle.

Aaron (29:42)
Yeah, let's try it.

really?

Is there anything in there? Like are there offices that are just empty or is it just like a husk of a building?

Ade (30:08)
I mean, it's basically a husk of a building. there are floors and presumably people could work there, but they don't lease it out.

Aaron (30:13)
That's a good gig if you can get it on that building.

Ade (30:17)
by the way, the, you know, the ball stuck and there's a whole storyline of we need Kaminsky, which I didn't understand. It's this engineer that was fired and he's the only one that knows how to fix the, the ball.

But his answer is there's a short in it and he has to find the short like.

Aaron (30:33)
Yeah. Yeah.

And Ludacris is like, that's easy, easy fix. And I'm like, maybe.

Ade (30:40)
Yeah, but it's also like there's a whole team of technicians that are like, we only need this guy. I don't know much about electricianing, but I'm pretty sure that most would know. it's a short and how to, how to find a short and fix it.

Aaron (30:56)
Also, I would presume that they hired a contractor to build this thing for them that is also in charge of making sure it works. isn't there a contact that they can call at the place who built this fucking thing to be like, it's not working, you need to get it working? I would assume that part of their responsibility when they build this thing is making sure it goes up and fucking drops.

Ade (31:11)
Yeah.

Yeah. I don't think the marketing VP or whatever is going to be the one trying to figure it out.

Aaron (31:25)
The only person that they could get to fix it was this electrician they had already fired. Played by Hector Elizondo, by the way, who is in a lot of these movies. He was in Princess Diaries, and I believe he was in the other, like, Valentine's Day.

Ade (31:31)
Yeah.

Yeah, he'll...

Valentine's Day.

Yeah, he looked familiar for sure. I've definitely seen him in a bunch of stuff

Aaron (31:49)
Yeah, he's been in a lot of

this, these early 2000 rom-coms. I watched princess diaries with Amanda at her request, a while ago. And I was like, this guy,

Ade (31:57)
Yeah.

You can own up to it. don't have to you don't have to say that it was it was her

that wanted to see it. You can just say you wanted to see it.

Aaron (32:06)
I liked it a lot more than I liked this movie. But I was like, this guy is in fucking everything. Hector Elizondo.

Ade (32:13)
Do you want to talk about any other storylines that were particularly bad? Can we talk about, can we talk about Jensen for a little bit? He's played by Banja, John Bon Jovi. ⁓ is he not the worst professional ever? He.

Aaron (32:19)
They're all bad.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, ⁓ I had

this conversation mid movie with John.

Ade (32:35)
Yeah,

I mean, there's a whole scene where Hilary Swank has to convince him to perform and he's just like looking, you know, desolate because yeah, yeah, the whole storyline is he was engaged to Katherine Heigl's character and then left because he had to go on tour and I'm like, and then sets up this whole thing on New Year's Eve to talk to her again. And I was just, I was just confused the whole time. Like, first of all,

Aaron (32:44)
I made a lot of mistakes in my life.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Ade (33:03)
You can go on tour and still be married, right? Like I don't like he quits his, he quits his tour to be with her, which like that seems like you can't just do that. Yeah. You're, you're, you're kicked out of the movie and you're sued by so many people. Uh, he has to be convinced to perform because he's sad that she doesn't, she's not into him anymore. He quits his New Year's Eve gig to go hang out with her. And I don't know. It was just like.

Aaron (33:06)
Yeah.

Drastic

You ⁓

Ade (33:33)
He just annoyed me the whole time. Like this seems so unrealistic.

Aaron (33:37)
Yeah.

Yeah, he was just sitting on the back of a car, not performing when he was supposed to be. she's and Hillary Swank's like, what's the problem? And he's like, I'm just, you know, feeling like I made a lot of mistakes this year and like, OK, well, you have a fucking contract to perform at this event. So.

Ade (33:52)
Yeah.

It's just one night. I

know this is a movie, but you don't have to get the girl to fall in love with you tonight. Just focus on your job and then tomorrow, why you try to sweep her off her feet?

by the way, so much exposition in this movie. I mean, when you have 400 characters all packed into a two hour movie.

Aaron (34:16)
Yeah, almost entirely exposition.

Ade (34:25)
Like, why don't you just cut out some of these storylines so you can show us and not tell us.

Aaron (34:29)
Yeah. Did you like Matthew Broderick's cameo?

Ade (34:33)
I mean, it's hard to say that I liked anything. I mean, no, I don't know. mean, like good for him that he was there, but he's the, president of Times Square Alliance. And why is the vice president doing all the work? Like you should, yeah, you just roll up in a limo to chew her out. Like.

Aaron (34:44)
I know, he's doing nothing.

Awesome.

Ade (34:51)
I don't think that's

how presidents and vice presidents work in most jobs.

Aaron (34:55)
Yeah, also his name was Buhlerton.

Ade (34:59)
Nice. Yeah. But he was uncredited. Did they say that in the movie?

Aaron (35:02)
I hated it. Yeah.

She called him when he pulled up there like, Buhlerton needs to speak to you or something. Yeah, I hated it.

Did you like the tow truck driver?

Ade (35:18)
he had one of my favorite quotes. ⁓ Did I not write it down? I'll never understand people with hair.

Aaron (35:20)
Yep.

I got it.

Oh, that was not the line I wrote. He had two good ones. His other one was me and my girl are going to smash a 12 pack and watch porn. He was played by comedian. He.

Ade (35:30)
Yeah.

⁓ Yeah.

Aaron (35:46)
Is a friend of Jerry Seinfeld. He was in Seinfeld back in the day. He played the doorman in that episode where Jerry got into a bit of a tiff with the doorman.

Larry Miller is his name.

He was also in Pretty Woman, which was directed by Gary Marshall.

Ade (36:03)
Yeah, he's been in a lot of stuff, 10 Things I Hate About You and yeah, he was funny.

Aaron (36:07)
Yeah, I liked him.

Yeah, I thought he had a... If Robert De Niro wasn't my favorite plot line character, he would have been probably just my favorite one-off ⁓ character, because he was as bitter and jaded as I am.

Ade (36:30)
Yeah. Any other favorite quotes?

Aaron (36:32)
Yeah, I liked him.

My God, I no favorites. have a lot that I wrote down that I thought were stupid. Sarah Paulson played the other woman who was giving birth along with Jessica Beale, and she said for for twenty five grand, they can put the camera in my hoo-ha.

Ade (36:43)
Yeah.

You

Aaron (36:51)
Like, ⁓ really? That's not that much money for that. I'm sure somebody will take you up on that.

Ade (36:56)
Hahaha

Ha

Aaron (37:03)
⁓ also, Abigail Breslin played the daughter of Sarah, Jessica Parker, and she was talking with her friends and one of her friends said, do you even know how to kiss? another person said, there's a, there's a video on the internet for that. And somebody else said to one for regular kissing and one for passionate.

Ade (37:16)
you

Yeah, 2011 early days of the internet where there are only two videos.

Aaron (37:26)
There's

there's two videos on kissing on the Internet, apparently. Yeah, also Abigail Breslin at one point in the movie, she's fighting with her mom and like a train station and she lifts her shirt up and says, this is not a training bra.

Ade (37:30)
Yeah.

Yeah. And then, and

then her mom says, this is not girls gone wild, which felt like another 2011, reference, I guess.

Aaron (37:51)
Yeah, it's a callback.

Ade (37:54)
I hated one guy says, sorry, I don't speak Spanish. I'm from Ohio. I'm like.

Aaron (38:00)
Didn't hear that.

Ade (38:02)
Yeah, like fucking, you know, New York, condescension towards people in the Midwest.

Aaron (38:08)
Yeah.

Ade (38:08)
Sophia Vergara at some point says, celebrities, they're just like us. And I felt like that perfectly encapsulated the theme that they're trying to put forth with this movie. Like, look at all these celebrities. They're just regular people like you trying to find love.

Aaron (38:09)
Do have any others?

Yeah. ⁓

Yeah, that line felt a lot like all of those celebrities singing Imagine during COVID lockdown.

Ade (38:34)
Yeah,

that's a good call. That's exactly how I felt when I heard that.

Aaron (38:41)
Yeah. So Sophia Vergara also said in my country, when a man gets on one knee, it's because he wants to get married or he's been shot. Yeah. And I'm like this, I guarantee it wasn't a Colombian who wrote that line and she had to deliver it.

Ade (38:49)
Sometimes both.

Yeah, no, that seemed.

Yeah.

a couple of final notes. wasn't Holly Berry's character the least busy nurse ever.

Aaron (39:05)
Yeah, she just hung out by De Niro's bed the whole day.

Ade (39:09)
and fell asleep on New Year's Eve. I'm pretty sure

New Year's Eve is pretty busy for hospitals.

Aaron (39:16)
Yeah, I think so. I thought so, at least.

Ade (39:19)
Yeah.

Aaron (39:21)
How long are we into this episode?

I feel like I've already run out of shit to talk about this movie. I have some other quotes.

Josh Demel's character was getting flirted with by a bunch of women after he gave his speech, and they were all like, I want to take you home. And he was like, I'm a sandwich.

Ade (39:48)
Ha

Aaron (39:49)
Cause his character's name's Sam I guess?

Ade (39:52)
I didn't get that.

Aaron (39:54)
I liked the actress who played his mom, Cherry Jones. I don't know what I've seen her in.

there were so many actors in this that, how did they make it so bad? I mean, it's probably too many.

Ade (40:07)
It

yeah, it's because it's too many cooks. I guess I already said this, but my overall thing was every storyline was thin. Every character was thin and I just didn't care about any of them. just became a slog where, and maybe it would have been better if any of them had actually been funny. Like any of the storylines. I think I.

Aaron (40:26)
I know.

Ade (40:29)
Probably like Zac Efron's character the most because he was the only one that like he seemed to be really pushing his character. Like he was, he was playing it up and you know, he, the character had a lot of joy and excitement and a lot of energy and he at least like, you know, brought that to the screen, but most of them just, I don't know, we're, we're having a miserable time in whatever storyline they're in and

Aaron (40:41)
Yeah.

Ade (40:58)
I was just having an even more miserable time watching it.

Aaron (41:01)
We picked completely different favorite characters. Yours was the only one who had any life in him at all. And I picked the guy that was literally dying. Because I related to him.

Ade (41:07)
Hahaha.

Lifeless. Yeah.

Yeah. Nice. Well, what are your alternate picks for this movie?

Aaron (41:26)
I went the easy route. I picked love actually. It's an ensemble holiday rom-com done much better.

Ade (41:36)
that's a movie that's in the same spirit. Like, I know some people hate that movie because of its earnestness and cheesiness and all that, but I feel like that's a movie where you laugh at a lot of the characters and like you get invested in their storylines and care if they get together or not. yeah, I like that movie.

Aaron (41:57)
Yeah.

Leave it up to the Brits to do it right.

Ade (42:00)
Yeah. Well, my alternate pick is 200 cigarettes, not by the Brits, by the Americans. and, another ensemble New Year's Eve movie. I, I've watched that movie several times and I love it. It's a great cast. feel like it's a bunch of.

Gen X favorites that are all five, 10 years older than me. And like, I'm watching older brothers and sisters on screen, but yeah, Ben Affleck, Janine Garofalo, Paul Rudd, Courtney Love, Dave Chappelle, Christina Ricci, a bunch of great actors. And it's funny.

Aaron (42:27)
Yeah.

Yeah, really good cast.

Yep, this one wasn't. I wish it was. It would have been a lot better experience.

Ade (42:44)
Ha

Yeah.

Yeah, definitely. Well, that brings horrible holidays to an end, fortunately, unfortunately.

Aaron (42:57)
Why do we continue to do this to ourselves?

Ade (42:59)
I don't know, I'm looking forward to

having some time to actually watch some good movies. I need to cleanse my palate. I felt like sitting down to watch New Year's Eve. was just like, there's this dread. Yeah. I knew it was going to be bad. I shouldn't have watched the trailer before.

Aaron (43:03)
I know.

It was a slog. Yeah, it was rough. Yeah.

Well, we saw when we were doing research to find movies for this, I saw a Reddit post that was somebody else looking for New Year's Eve themed movies and they had a few, 200 cigarettes was one they mentioned and they were like, New Year's Eve is unwatchable. So I need something else. I was like, no, that's on our list. ⁓

Ade (43:39)
Ha ha

Yeah, well, we're here to watch it, so you don't have to.

Aaron (43:47)
Yeah, don't. I wouldn't recommend it.

Ade (43:49)
Yeah. Well, send us an email at the worst movie podcast at gmail.com. If you have any feedback or thoughts, please subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever. I'm Ade

Aaron (44:01)
I'm Aaron, thanks for listening to the Worst Movie Podcast.