2000 American comedy film by Chris Koch
Snow Day is a 2000 American comedy film directed by Chris Koch, written by Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi, and produced by Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies. It stars Chris Elliott, Mark Webber, Jean Smart, and Chevy Chase with supporting roles by Schuyler Fisk, Pam Grier, Zena Grey, Josh Peck, Emmanuelle Chriqui, and David Paetkau. The film premiered on January 29, 2000, and was theatrically released on February 11, 2000. It takes place during the events of a record snow day in upstate New York, depicting various subplots including a group of kids planning to thwart a snowplow driver in an attempt to get a second snow day. This is the first of two films to star both Josh Peck and Zena Grey, the other being Max Keeble's Big Move, released the following year.
Snow Day was met with generally negative reviews but was a box office success. The soundtrack single "Another Dumb Blonde", by Hoku, was her one-hit wonder, peaking at 27 on the Billboard Hot 100. The film was released on home video on October 3, 2000, and re-released on DVD on September 26, 2017.
A musical remake was released on December 16, 2022, on Paramount+.
Plot
A voice-over by Hal Brandston describes how snow forms from crystallized water and how a snow day isn't just an event when schools close, but a day of magic. Despite an unusually warm season, a snow storm descends upon Syracuse, New York, leaving the Brandston family's neighborhood covered in a blanket of snow. This causes Principal Ken Weaver to become a target for children who pelt him with snowballs.
Tom, the local weatherman (and father of Hal, Natalie, and Randy), is involved in a rivalry with Chad Symmonz, a weatherman from another station. Even though Tom predicted the previous night's snowstorm first, Chad is taking credit for the news.
His wife Laura is a workaholic, but cannot make it into work as she and youngest son Randy are severely snowed in. Stuck at home with Randy, she eventually takes her mind off work and lets loose with her son in the snow.
Meanwhile, Hal plans to spend the day trying to win over his crush Claire Bonner, the school's most popular girl who has just broken up with her loud jock boyfriend Chuck, after Hal found Claire's sperm whale anklet in the swimming pool. His friend Lane expresses disbelief at his plan, reasoning to him that love is about finding someone you can stand to be around for more than ten minutes at a time, but she agrees to accompany him on his mission. Hal tries everything from reaching out to Claire live on his dad's news station and facing off with Chuck in a snowmobile chase.
Natalie plans to use the magic of the snow day to take on her archenemy Snowplowman, a local villain who is said to run over kids and plow the streets so efficiently that there has never been a second snow day in years. With her friends Chet and Wayne, Natalie tricks Snowplowman into thinking Wayne is dead in the street. The diversion works as Snowplowman leaves the plow to investigate, and she sneaks inside the plow. Natalie is attacked by his bird Trudy, so she kidnaps the violent creature. Snowplowman retaliates by grabbing Wayne. Snowplowman agrees to swap with Natalie. She will get Wayne back and a second snow day in exchange for the bird. However, Snowplowman goes back on his word following the exchange and continues on his route to plow the snow. Natalie is about to give up when she devises a plan.
Tom is able to prove Chad is a fraud when he's unable to answer basic meteorology questions on air, proving he discovered the storm first. With Chad exposed and fleeing, Tom wins back his status.
When Hal shows no signs of giving up, he ropes Lane into attracting Claire to a snow art of a sperm whale where he finds out that she actually likes zebras. After Hal dodges Chuck's group, Lane gets angry with him and admits she hasn't done what she wants to do for the snow day. When Hal asks what is it, she kisses him and leaves. He later meets up with Claire at the school's pool where she kisses him, but Hal realizes that he was wrong and he has stronger feelings for Lane. Claire encourages Hal to go after her.
Later that night, Natalie faces off with Snowplowman alone. He taunts her, but she reveals an army of kids have united to stop him. The kids tie him to a street sign and commandeer his plow, restoring the snow onto the roads.
In search of Lane, Hal is attacked by Chuck. A fight ensues, but Hal is saved when Natalie and friends plow Chuck away into a snow bank with the plow. Hal is impressed with Natalie's accomplishment of her mission and says he wants to spend the soon-to-be second snow day with her.
Hal finds Lane at the local skating rink and apologizes to her. He repeats her line about true love being about finding someone you can stand to be around for ten minutes, and then asks her "You got ten minutes?" They kiss. The Brandstons, Lane, and Claire have found new paths in their lives.
In the final scene, Principal Weaver arrives home only to be greeted by a volley of snowballs from the kids.
Production
In February 1999, it was announced Nick and Paramount would team on Snow Day.[2] It was mostly filmed in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.[3]
Reception
Box office
The film opened at number three at the North American box office, making US$14.3 million in its first weekend, behind The Beach and Scream 3, the latter of which was on its second week at the top spot. Snow Day was a box office success, earning $60,020,107 in its domestic run, and $62,464,731 worldwide.[1]
Critical response
Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes reports the film holds an approval rating of 29% based on 66 reviews, with an average score of 4.26/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Weak assembly of characters and story lines made this movie forgettable and silly."[4] Metacritic gives it a weighted average score of 34 out of 100, based on reviews from 22 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews."[5] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.[6]
In a comparison to 1983's A Christmas Story, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times called Snow Day "an uninspired assembly of characters and story lines that interrupt one another until the battle against Snowplow Man takes over just when we're hoping he will disappear from the movie and set free the teenage romance trapped inside it."[7] Aside from the film itself, Ebert also wrote, "What a thoughtless place is Hollywood, and what talent it must feel free to waste", in reference to Pam Grier being given another "lousy role" after her "wonderful performance" in Jackie Brown (1997).[7] Entertainment Weekly's Owen Gleiberman wrote "Even Snow Day's winter wonderland looks fake," and gave it an F grade.[8]
Accolades
Musical remake
On March 1, 2022, it was announced that a remake of the film had gone into production in Montreal. Reimagined as a musical, it stars Ky Baldwin, Jerry Trainor, Laura Bell Bundy, Rob Huebel, Michaela Russell, Shelby Simmons, and Fabi Aguirre. It was released on Nickelodeon and Paramount+ on December 16 of that same year.[13][14] In June 2023, the film was removed from the service.[15]
