New Year's Day is a 2001 comedy-drama film starring Andrew Lee Potts, Bobby Barry, Jacqueline Bisset, Anastasia Hille, Michael Kitchen, Sue Johnston, Ralph Brown and Marianne Jean-Baptiste. It was written by Ralph Brown and directed by Suri Krishnamma.
The film follows two teenagers, Jake (Potts) and Steve (Barry) as they cope with life after being the sole survivors of an avalanche. Their teacher also survives the accident, but remains comatose and dies soon after the start of the film. The two boys make a suicide pact agreeing that on the one-year anniversary of the avalanche, they will kill themselves. The two spend their last year living life to the fullest. This takes the form of a list of "tasks", which they both must fulfill before dying.
The movie's screenplay is written by Brown, and deals with themes such as the generation gap, the conflicts that surround today's youngsters, suicide, crossing boundaries and how people are affected by tragedy. Brown has spoken of New Year's Day being prompted by the killing of James Bulger, in the sense of a storyline concerning two young people who are surrounded by grown-ups who have no idea about what they are doing.
New Year's Day won best film at the Raindance Film Festival 2001, and best film at the Sapporo Film Festival 2001. In February 2001, it also took the Grand Prize in the 12th Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival which was attended by director Suri Krishnamma.
The film contains a cover of the Tim Hardin song "Reason To Believe" by Paul Weller, recorded specially for the movie.
Famous quotes containing the words year and/or day:
“You have been here only a short time, Mr. Barnard. You cannot know what it is to live here month upon month, year after year, breathing this infernal air, absorbing the miasma of barbarity that permeates these walls, especially this chamber.”
—Richard Matheson (b. 1926)
““The Greeks used to say,” he said bitterly, using a phrase that had been a long time on his mind, “that when a man became a slave, on the first day he lost one-half of his virtue.””
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)