You won’t hear any official reviews for The Revenant from critics until Dec. 4, but we’re already hearing some rumors following the first screening Monday night for an audience of award voters at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Goldwyn Theater.
The film certainly made an impact on the audience. As THR claims, voters left with strong reactions, most of them being positive. However, the long runtime (over two and a half hours) and the gruesome images had some people walking out of the theater.
There is one thing most everyone agreed on though. Leonardo DiCaprio did a wonderful job in the movie and deserves to win that first Oscar. It’s hard to view this as a real possibility considering he’s been screwed so many times before, but the competition does look less frightening this year.
After the screening was complete, Leonardo participated in a Q&A session, where he admitted the extreme conditions while filming made everyone’s job harder, “It was the most difficult film, I think, that any of us have ever done.” He said.
He also revealed they rehearsed like a stage production for an unusual amount of time because they often only had 90 minutes a day to capture “the beautiful, illustrious Chivo light.”
The Revenant will have a limited release in the United States on Christmas day, followed by a wide release starting on January 8, 2016.