Jason Reitman Receives Screenwriting Award From Mar Del Plata Pageant

On Wednesday evening the director of Saturday Evening accepted an award for his movie from Argentina’s Mar del Plata Worldwide Movie Pageant, on a really big day for the South American nation.

Jason Reitman acquired the Astor Piazzolla Award for Finest Screenplay for his dramedy in regards to the launch of the very first broadcast of Saturday Evening 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 common’s residence in Los Angeles, with the Mar del Plata competition’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 yet another than Saturday Evening received.”

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 Common Héctor María Monacci, the consul’s spouse and leisure trade notables. “And most significantly, pleased Independence Day.”

Along with serving as creative 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 identified 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 motion pictures,” Reitman famous. “And Gabriel got here right here as a result of he loves motion pictures. And whenever you meet one other one that loves cinema as a lot as you do, you instantly really feel such as you’ve discovered somebody that you just’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 Evening, which is in regards to the opening evening of Saturday Evening Stay, which is a couple of group of younger individuals who got here collectively to placed on a present that had by no means been achieved earlier than. And after I received to Mar del Plata, what I discovered was a bunch of younger filmmakers who felt precisely the identical they usually had been children, they usually beloved cinema. And after the films, they’d take me out to this bowling alley, they usually received actually drunk. After which they’d discuss motion pictures till the solar got here up. And it jogged my memory of precisely the kind of neighborhood I used to be searching for after I was a child.”

“It was my first time in Argentina,” Reitman commented. “I fell in love along 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 competition, 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 identify in concrete right here.’ I mentioned, ‘What?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, it’s much like the Mann Chinese language. You’re going to write down your identify 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 achieved this earlier than,” Reitman recounted. “Once you’re writing it, it’s method more durable than you’d assume. And I’ve no follow at this, however that is going to be everlasting. It’s within the floor. Are you aware whenever you’re writing a birthday card and also you begin writing letters, however they’re too large? And also you begin to understand that you just don’t have sufficient house to write down all of the letters. So on account of this, I wished to write down ‘Jason Reitman,’ however I ran out of house. So, it simply says, ‘Jason’ — that’s it. There are handprints. After which simply ‘Jason.’ So for those who 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.”