"Saturday Night" - Didn't land the punchline.

Josh
Feb 17, 2025
4 min read

Jason Reitman (2024)

It's like a mediocre skit.

Saturday Night (Live) is something I had zero exposure to as a kid. Maybe it's due to not having Foxtel (cable here in Oz) so my vision on those networks was an absolute zero. But I never even heard anyone really talk about it growing up, so this is a review coming from ground zero. I'm here to see a story inspired by the infamous launch of the first episode of one of the most famous and longest running shows in the history of TV. And it felt so close to being good but it didn't really hit me.

We kicked off with an impressive opening which had me settled in and ready for something like Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014). We had this massive oner jumping between different cast members getting ready for different parts of the show. All leading back to Lorne Michaels, played by Gabriel LaBelle, the stressful producer trying to get this show off the ground. A show he doesn't know the elevator pitch for, a show with too many acts for the schedule, a show that will be a milestone for a generation, a revolutionary step forward for TV. So we get the weight on his shoulders experiencing the production through his eyes with a cacophony of diegetic sounds that build and build, with a layer of fast pacing drumming (against reminding me of Birdman's jazzy improv soundtrack). And it makes sense to use Birdman as an inspiration, as thematically pulling everything off within “one” take goes into the Live aspect of the show being produced. But we rarely got anything to that level of complexity again. We get the occasional oner when we're back on the ground floor getting everything ready but not to the heights of the opening.

And as a project manager I watch having mild panic attacks as we're watching this massive list of in-progress tasks getting done in the final few minutes before we go live. Yet something was holding the tension back… I know the show is going to launch. I know because I saw Musk on an episode not all that long ago. The accuracy of the night is of course exaggerated with some moments taking truth such as John Belushi (Matt Wood) not signing his contract until the last minute or the pressure from the network executives to get the show off the ground. While most other scenarios were pulled from various moments in SNL history. And while we watch all these things go wrong the movie didn't earn the ending of Michaels succeeding in getting this wild idea on to the screens of millions. Everyone just happens to coming together and help out during the last minute, all the issues that we've seen suddenly get resolved out of nowhere. It feels so schmaltzy when the cold lazy teamsters decide to pull their weight out of nowhere when a few scenes ago they refused to help. People don't have an arch, more like a line. But what I was hoping for was creative solutions to problems. Seeing the compromises required from a producer. We see him start pulling acts to fit within the required run time but there isn't much of a consequence to it, he just starts throwing around sticky notes. Even after mentioning there's three musical acts, we don't see their reaction. So it doesn't feel like a tough choice needing to be made that's gonna hurt his perceived character. It all just works out in the end.

While not knowing the majority of the characters real life counterparts except for some of the bigger movie stars such as Chevy Chase (Cory Michael Smith), Dan Aykroyd (Dylan O'Brien), Billy Crystal (Billy Crystal), Jim Henson (Nicholas Braun) plus the two most well known comics of the time John Belushi and Andy Kauffman (Nicholas Braun, again), each actor managed to get the essence of their character. Cory Michael Smith who played Chevy Chase got his speech down so well I forgot that it wasn't actually Chase. Everyone else did a fine job but no one really grew as a character. Everyone was a young up and comer with a lot of energy and they ended as young legends with a lot of energy.

Yet there's moments that feel like they're setting up for a lesson. Aykroyd is presented as a womaniser who uses the same pick up lines on everyone he can, which hurts Laraine Newman (Emily Fairn) in particular. And while rehearsing the "Hard Hat" skit the women acting as New York construction workers cat calling an embarrassed exposed Aykroyd. She takes the joke to the edge by using his lines, while mildly shocked and embarrassed by the skit, the scene ends. He leaves and the show goes on. Something they lay on the surface is the abuse of power from the higher ups and legends of TV at the time. Milton Berle played by J.K. Simmons, goes around flirting and flashing his goods in front of women. With no reprocessing but almost like a splash of water to the face. Like you're seeing the underbelly that will never get faced until decades later. And using this power to threaten Chase, nothing comes from it. His character isn't challenged, he just exits the scene and goes back to making jokes.

While to SNL experts who got to experience tuning into the rise of these modern day legendary comedians, both who are still kicking and those who have passed, there might be something to get from this. Easter eggs or jokes to some of the most famous skits produced by the show but for me there was just the movie. A movie that was reeling me in at the start but then let the line go loose through the second half that it lost me in the third. Despite obvious skill from Jason Reitman, and with material that should have been perfect for him, it's a middle of the road flick that I won't remember. Kinda like watching a comedian that's hitting the beats but the punchlines leave echoes of crickets rather than laughter.