Chris Connelly, MTV film guy, Premiere executive editor, and official poster boy for ass-lickers everywhere, interviewed director Risa Bramon Garcia and asked her why she picked New Year's Eve 1981 as the setting for her film. Although her answer should have been, "Why don't you ask the screenwriter?" she went on to say something to the effect of "It was a fun time. It was before AIDS and Reagonomics. We were all trying to get laid." Maybe she should have been down at the local community college taking Directing 101 instead.

Her answer, however, speaks directly to the significance of the film. It follows a bunch of people -- the kind of talent train wreck Hollywood still insists on referring to optimistically as an "ensemble cast" -- as they try to make their way to a party being given by Monica (Martha Plimpton). There's Bridget (Nicole Parker) and Caitlyn (Angela Featherstone), who are both interested in a bartender (Ben Affleck). There's Val (Christina Ricci) and Stephie (Gaby Hoffman), who get lost and are followed by Tom (Casey Affleck) and Dave (Guillermo Diaz). There's Lucy (Courtney Love) and Kevin (Paul Rudd), who are best friends. Finally, there's Jack (Jay Mohr) and Cindy (Kate Hudson). As frequently happens in New York City, they all manage to ride in the same cab (driven by Dave Chappelle).

The first problem with the movie is that there's no good reason to care about any of these people. The second problem is that all the actors apparently know nobody cares about them, so they just act as anyone might on New Year's Eve -- like imbeciles. It's one of those films that makes you wonder whether the filmmakers are trying to be cryptically profound, or whether they've simply been lobotomized. In this case, it seems like both.