OK, so...

I pretty much knew I was in the bag for this movie from the jump. Like, literally from the Variety casting announcements, I was intrigued.

I'm really into movies where the whole concept is "can-they-pull-off-the-thing" (even if we know, due to history, if they're going to succeed or fail). I love big ensemble comedies. And I've been watching SNL for decades now, with some of my earliest television memories being my mother sitting me down to watch Comedy Central (or was it Comedy Network then?) reruns of classic episodes. (It resulted in me yelling "JANE YOU IGNORANT SLUT" in the schoolyard.)

Layer on top of that, for the better part of the last 16 years I've been producing a comedy event, and you have a film that's directly focused on the Marty Day demographic.

It helps that it's really well done, too. I'm pretty confident that this is one of those movies where in the 2030s, we'll have a Buzzfeed Article where it's like THIS MOVIE FEATURED X, Y AND Z, ALL BEFORE THEY WERE STARS.

The level of impression to the original people is -- across the board -- strong. Corey Michael Smith gets the ego and self-righteousness of Chevy Chase. Lamorne Morris shines as Garrett Morris (why are we not putting him in more movies?). Dylan O'Brien kills it as Dan Aykroyd, and Ella Hunt brings Gilda Radner's etherial joy to life. But we'd be at a loss if the man at the center of it all -- Gabriel LaBelle's Lorne Michaels -- was unwatchable. Instead, he's the perfect eye of the hurricane that is the show. Hell of a career so far for this kid -- Spielberg AND Lorne. No pressure there. And holy hell, where did Tommy Dewey (playing SNL writer Michael O'Donoghue) come from?

The movie zooms by, an anxiety attack of everything-which-can-go-wrong-will-go-wrong, and yes, I'm sure it's not terribly accurate and played up for melodrama. But even with that, I'm fine with it, since the final product is such a roller coaster.

Special kudos to Nicholas Braun for nailing both Andy Kaufman AND Jim Henson, and holy shit, it's about time Jason Reitman made another movie I adored as much as his first three films.

It looks like that this isn't going to have a terribly long run in theaters, but once it's available at home, I've a feeling I'll be running it back time and time again. Goddamn I love when a movie gets me this excited.