Saturday Night is probably a movie you shouldn’t see if you’re taking blood pressure medication or if you’ve had stimulants in the last four hours. It’s a film that sticks to real time, every minute is a minute of action in the film, with very few breaths between lines, which makes for a kind of West Wing meets the Seven Fishes episode from the Bear meets Birdman meets the Marvelous Mrs Mazel, and the sheer frenetic chaotic insane energy of it matched with the discipline of doing it in real-time makes it a standout film for its genre, but also just a really fun experience generally.
I read an interview with the writers of this movie, where they describe how fun it would be to have a film where time is the villain: “Time was our Sauron” is the quote. I think that’s strength and virtue of this biopic that’s not really a biopic, pulling completely opposite responses from different cast members depicted in the film WHO STILL HAPPEN TO BE ALIVE TODAY. I’ve sort of been sleeping on this review for a few months (hi 2024, it’s Jan 2025!) and watching the People’s Joker just a couple days ago which also has so many opinions about the state of SNL and Lorne Michaels is such a serendipitous pairing.
The ensemble cast of young comedians for this movie is really remarkable: I think about the fact that I’m one of like eight people who saw Gabriel Labelle’s Snack Shack last year and it’s so cool to see other people (Bestie) fawning over his cute stunned doe impression the entire movie. Rachel Sennott, most influential actress-writer-director of her generation, makes the Rosie Shuster-Michaels partnership richly weird and compelling, the way she leaves so much unspoken, loving him so much while also clearly gunning for a one night stand among the crew. Mazerunner’s (???) Dylan O’Brien plays a soulful Dan Ackroyd but also blesses me with the trivia of having starred nearly 15 years ago in a horror parody of Charlie Brown for Funny or Die called Blockhead’s Revenge. You’re welcome.
Matt Wood’s Belushi is part animal part bee part artiste, speaks mostly in grunts and has some of the most tender and insane scenes in the movie. Kim Matula’s Jane Curtin has some bonkers improv in the cheap seats scene across from Game Night‘s Lamorne Morris playing Garrett Morris, the only black member of SNL, an older, and cerebral actor, wringing his hands over his place in the cast. Cooper Hoffman does a great job playing himself and not a 17 year old boy.
The script is breathless, tripping over itself. It has a manic quality to it. The humor is mean: mean to muppets, moms, there are these roast-like moments that will cause you to disassociate they’re so funny, and then paired that with gentleness of Gilda Radner and the way that Rachel Sennott’s Rose is able to baby John Belushi into wearing a bee costume. The cameos are dynamo and the mise-en-abyme of watching young actors do impressions of young actors doing impressions is mesmerizing.
Notably amazing gags: Labelle’s Lorne is just constantly doing his hangdog look from failure to failure. The llama(!)! The surrealist soap commercial in the audience. Sendups, callbacks, the sketches immortal. Practical effects. The crew’s open contempt for their bosses. The effortless crowd-handling of Chevy Chase. The philandering of Dan Ackroyd and the jealousy of not being noticed, even while he’s self-conscious about being objectified by the ladies, even as the comedians pile up outside the door of the PA while he goes through his bad trip. Billy Crystal using chips for a safari scene.
