Joey Magidson
Sometimes, it’s nice to be right. Ever since I debuted Year in Advance predictions for the Academy Awards months ago, I’ve included Jason Reitman‘s SNL 1975 in the Best Picture lineup. Well, I got the title wrong, as the film is now called Saturday Night, but this week brought news that the movie has been dated for October. That date potentially bodes well for the flick, proving that sometimes I’m not a complete blithering idiot. Not only is Saturday Night here to shake up the stasis of the summer awards season, James Mangold‘s A Complete Unknown also came out as a 2024 contender. The Oscar season has some new possible players, so it was high time to update my predictions. You’ll see that below, but today I want to focus on these new additions to the field.
Saturday Night is, of course, a look at the production of the first Saturday Night Live. Reitman directs and co-writes with Gil Kenan, while the lead cast includes the likes of Gabriel LaBelle as Lorne Michaels, Cooper Hoffman as Dick Ebersol, and Rachel Sennott as Rosie Shuster. Supporting players include Nicholas Braun as Jim Henson, Ella Hunt as Gilda Radner, Dylan O’Brien as Dan Aykroyd, J. K. Simmons as Milton Berle, Cory Michael Smith as Chevy Chase, Finn Wolfhard, and more.
I fully expect the movie to go to at least one of the Telluride Film Festival and Toronto International Film Festival, though both would not be at all out of the question. The October 11th release date suggests confidence on the part of Sony. Going from a festival to wide release, high off of good buzz, could be huge for Reitman and company.
Potentially, the film could be a player in Best Picture, Best Director (for Reitman), Best Actor (for LaBelle), Best Supporting Actor (for Hoffman), Best Supporting Actress (for Sennott), and Best Original Screenplay (for Kenan and Reitman). The premise is Academy friendly, to be sure. One doesn’t have to look too hard to see it possibly play in a similar Oscar sandbox as something like Being the Ricardos. Time will tell, but I remain very bullish on this one. If all goes well, the flick has really top tier potential in Picture.
As for A Complete Unknown, this biopic of a young Bob Dylan clearly has a baity feel to it. Mangold directs and co-writes with Jay Cocks, with Timothée Chalamet leading the way as Dylan. Supporting players include Monica Barbaro, Elle Fanning, Dan Fogler, Boyd Holbrook, Scoot McNairy, Edward Norton, and more. The film isn’t out until December and seems unlikely to play any festivals, so this could be an X factor for much of the season, which could potentially even play into its favor.
A targeted campaign here could actually go very well, given how Oscar loves a biopic. Best Picture, Best Director (for Mangold), Best Actor (for Chalamet), Best Supporting Actor (for Norton), Best Supporting Actress (for Fanning), and Best Adapted Screenplay (for Cocks and Mangold) seems like a safe bet. How well it goes remains to be seen, given changing Academy tastes, but it may prove hard to resist.
We obviously don’t know how things will turn out for either flick, but their entry into the race suggests not just studio confidence, but a sense that the race had openings as well. I’ve been writing about the quiet nature of things for months now, so Searchlight and Sony clearly agree.
Ultimately, it’s still very early. My prior predictions piece here spoke of a quiet summer. That’s still the case, even if I’ve updated them to reflect A Complete Unknown and Saturday Night being officially in the fray. You can see them both featured prominently, but that’s only until we actually lay eyes on them. I’ll see the latter before the former, I suspect, but they won’t remain unseen X factors forever, that’s for sure.
Folks, as always you can see my newest crack at advance Oscar predictions (which now will just be considered regular old new predictions, as opposed to year in advance) right here at Awards Radar. The changes are coming, and will continue to come, as we anticipate the fall festivals kicking off. Sit tight for another update right before the festivals begin…
Stay tuned for another update to these Oscar predictions before the fall festival season gets underway!
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