Synopsis: Sgt. Cole Lewis, mentally and physically scarred by his time served in Iraq and Afghanistan, finds humanity, compassion and friendship in a group of similarly injured veterans in the psychiatric ward at a remote Veterans Hospital. Through humor and pathos, Lewis becomes a ray of hope in the ward, as the men find a way to combat their post-war grief. However, just as their luck starts to change, Lewis soon faces his fiercest battle yet. [Synopsis courtesy of SXSW]
In the closing moments of "Happy New Year," writer-director K. Lorrel Manning's somber portrait of a despondent Iraq war veteran stuck in a ward for victims of post-traumatic stress disorder, fiction gives way to an unsettling truth: After nearly two hours of a close-up look at the burgeoning death ...
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