Jason Reitman Receives Screenwriting Award From Mar Del Plata Pageant

On Wednesday night time the director of Saturday Night time accepted an award for his movie from Argentina’s Mar del Plata Worldwide Movie Pageant, on a really special occasion for the South American nation.

Jason Reitman obtained the Astor Piazzolla Award for Finest Screenplay for his dramedy in regards to the launch of the very first broadcast of Saturday Night time Stay in October 1975. Reitman directed the movie and wrote it with Gil Kenan, a co-recipient of the award. Reitman attended the 39^th version of Mar del Plata final November however had departed the coastal Argentinian metropolis by the point the awards had been introduced.

The presentation of the screenplay award was made on the Argentinian consul normal’s residence in Los Angeles, with the Mar del Plata pageant’s co-artistic director Gabriel Lerman readily available, in addition to filmmaker Fede Álvarez [Alien: Romulus], who did the formal honors.

“I’m honored to be right here with one of many few males on this enterprise who has higher hair than me,” Reitman joked, acknowledging Álvarez’s spectacular chevelure. “And [he’s] a greater shooter.”

“Fede, what number of nominations did Alien [Romulus] get?” Reitman requested his fellow filmmaker.

“I misplaced depend,” Álvarez replied. “You lose depend.”

“Two? Is it three?” Reitman continued.

“Oscars?” mentioned Alvarez. “It was one.”

“It was one?” Reitman mentioned, joking, “It was another than Saturday Night time acquired.”

The reception and awards presentation coincided with Argentina’s Independence Day, marking the 209^th anniversary of the nation’s separation from Spain.

“That is an unbelievable honor,” Reitman informed the assembled crowd together with Consul Normal Héctor María Monacci, the consul’s spouse and leisure business notables. “And most significantly, completely satisfied Independence Day.”

Along with serving as inventive director of the Mar del Plata Worldwide Movie Pageant together with Jorge Stamadianos, Lerman is a journalist writing for publications in Argentina, Chile, Mexico and different elements of Latin America. He has been a voter for the Golden Globes since 2004, presently serving on the board of administrators for the successor voting group to the HFPA.

“Gabriel and I’ve recognized one another a very long time, and this can be a metropolis that brings individuals — Los Angeles — individuals gravitate right here. Some individuals gravitate simply because they wish to be round fame, however some individuals come right here as a result of they love films,” Reitman famous. “And Gabriel got here right here as a result of he loves films. And while you meet one other one who loves cinema as a lot as you do, you instantly really feel such as you’ve discovered somebody that you simply’ve been looking for since highschool.”

Referencing his look on the 39^th version of Mar del Plata, Reitman mentioned, “I used to be there with a movie known as Saturday Night time, which is in regards to the opening night time of Saturday Night time Stay, which is a few group of younger individuals who got here collectively to placed on a present that had by no means been accomplished earlier than. And after I acquired to Mar del Plata, what I discovered was a bunch of younger filmmakers who felt precisely the identical and so they had been youngsters, and so they liked cinema. And after the flicks, they’d take me out to this bowling alley, and so they acquired actually drunk. After which they’d discuss films till the solar got here up. And it jogged my memory of precisely the kind of neighborhood I used to be in search of after I was a child.”

“It was my first time in Argentina,” Reitman commented. “I fell in love together with your nation. I can not wait to return. And I had probably the most unbelievable expertise down there.”

The 40^th anniversary version of Mar del Plata will happen from Nov. 6-16. Whether or not he’s there for the 40^th or it takes Reitman a number of extra years to return to the pageant, you possibly can count on to see him with Sharpie in hand. That pertains to an anecdote he shared from his expertise final yr.

“One morning I get a textual content message from Gabriel and he says, ‘They need you to place your title in concrete right here.’ I mentioned, ‘What?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, it’s much like the Mann Chinese language. You’re going to put in writing your title within the floor.’ And I simply thought, are you certain they need me?” ‘Yeah, they need you to do it.’ Now, I’ve by no means accomplished this earlier than,” Reitman recounted. “Whenever you’re writing it, it’s method tougher than you’d assume. And I’ve no follow at this, however that is going to be everlasting. It’s within the floor. Have you learnt while you’re writing a birthday card and also you begin writing letters, however they’re too huge? And also you begin to notice that you simply don’t have sufficient house to put in writing all of the letters. So on account of this, I needed to put in writing ‘Jason Reitman,’ however I ran out of house. So, it simply says, ‘Jason’ — that’s it. There are handprints. After which simply ‘Jason.’ So if you happen to don’t realize it’s me, there’s no method on earth to know who signed it.”

He concluded, “So possibly in the future I’ll come again with a Sharpie, and I’ll fill in the remainder of it.”