Counting Down New Year’s Eve: Who’s in it the Most?

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Ashton Kutcher—10:30; Every movie about a holiday needs the humbug. I attempted to watch Valentine’s Day as research for this piece and was distracted by every single thing that was not Valentine’s Day. But I’ll bet a couple bucks on the fact that there’s someone in the movie who hates V-Day. The humbug. In this film, that’s Kutcher. He spends much of his film in a hoodie and pajama bottoms, trapped in an elevator with the overly cheery Lea Michele. Do they kiss? Why would I ruin this movie for you?

Katherine Heigl—9:00; A chef. And….that’s pretty much it.

Sarah Jessica Parker—7:26; The head (or someone high up) of the Radio City Music Hall Christmas spectacular, SJP does not want her 15-year old daughter to spend New Year’s Eve in Times Square with her teenage friends. Being a New Yorker, I can tell you that this is a completely reasonable position. But the daughter doesn’t listen, because she’s fifteen, mom, which is practically drinking age. SJP’s role in this film is to say “no” over and over again.

Abigail Breslin—She plays the daughter. I had no idea the little girl in this movie was Abigail Breslin, so I didn’t clock her on-screen appearances. I just kept saying, “Why is this no-name girl getting so much screen time?” Well, it’s because it was Abigail Breslin.

Robert De Niro—6:36; Jake La Motta spends all of his screen time in either a hospital bed or a wheelchair. He has one 90-second or so scene in which he imagines that his nurse is someone else that pretty much comprises the only acting in the movie.

Halle Berry—5:25; She’s De Niro’s nurse. She sits by his bedside and says things like, “Do you need anything?” or “It’s going to be OK,” like nurses do. Both of these people have won Academy Awards.

Til Schweiger—5:01; I felt like Butch and/or Sundance. Every time Schweiger appeared on screen, a voice in my head uttered, “Who is this guy?”

Sofia Vergara—4:56; “Isn’t it funny when Latinas speak in that crazy/lusty Latina accent of theirs and confuse words for other words, like psychotic for psychic? Who’s that lady that does it on that TV show? Let’s get her.”—The makers of this movie.

Ludacris—4:17; Luda was delightful in Fast Five (which, incidentally, is on our Top 10 Movies of 2011 list), but here he just looks dead. Or at least half-asleep. Dressed in an ill-fitting police uniform, he floats through this film speaking in a monotone and staring at the middle of Hilary Swank’s forehead

Hector Elizondo—2:45; “Oh crap, we have to put Hector in the movie.”

Robert Downey Jr.—12 seconds; The last shot of the film involves a camera crane shot through a post-festivity Times Square and up into the sky. For a dozen seconds, on the right side of the frame, a giant poster for the new film Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows (distributed by Warner Bros., who also put out New Year’s Eve, and who owns the company that owns this magazine) looms large. It was the laziest in-film plug for another film that I’ve ever seen.

As you can see, this is a Lea Michele/Hilary Swank/Michelle Pfeiffer/Josh Duhamel/Zac Efron film. Put those five names on a movie poster and see where it gets you.

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