Jesse Eisenberg When You Finish Saving the World

Festival Predictions

2022 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Jesse Eisenberg’s When You Finish Saving the World

Published on November 25, 2021

Everyone knows the actor, but we might have to think of him differently in the year ahead. Jesse Eisenberg‘s When You Finish Saving the World was an audiobook drama before it became in 2021, his directorial debut. Starring Julianne Moore and Finn Wolfhard, Eisenberg takes the plunge into some deep human condition issues and makes connections between people, time and place. The A24 folks have a huge year ahead of them — and this one certainly has wards potential. After Yang and Pieces of a Woman Cinematographer Benjamin Loeb is part of the crew.

Gist: This tells the story of three individuals working to understand each other and themselves: Nathan, a father learning to connect with his newborn son; Rachel, a young college student seeking to find her place in a relationship and in life, before marriage to Nathan; and Ziggy, their son, a teenager hoping to figure out where he came from, and where he’s headed.

Production Co./Producers: Julianne Moore, Fruit Tree’s Dave McCary, Emma Stone.

Prediction: U.S. DRAMATIC COMPETITION.

U.S. Distributor: A24.

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).