Martin Scorsese is urging filmmakers to save cinema, by doubling down on his call to fight comic book movie culture.
The storied filmmaker is revisiting the topic of comic book movies in a new profile for GQ. Despite facing intense blowback from filmmakers, actors and the public for the 2019 comments he made slamming the Marvel Cinematic Universe films â he called them theme parks rather than actual cinema â Scorsese isnât shying away from the topic.
âThe danger there is what itâs doing to our culture,â he told GQ. âBecause there are going to be generations now that think ⊠thatâs what movies are.â
GQâs Zach Baron posited that what Scorsese was saying might already be true, and the âKillers of the Flower Moonâ filmmaker agreed.
âThey already think that. Which means that we have to then fight back stronger. And itâs got to come from the grassroots level. Itâs gotta come from the filmmakers themselves,â Scorsese continued to the outlet. âAnd youâll have, you know, the Safdie brothers, and youâll have Chris Nolan, you know what I mean? And hit âem from all sides. Hit âem from all sides, and donât give up. ⊠Go reinvent. Donât complain about it. But itâs true, because weâve got to save cinema.â
Scorsese referred to movies inspired by comic books as âmanufactured contentâ rather than cinema.
âItâs almost like AI making a film,â he said. âAnd that doesnât mean that you donât have incredible directors and special effects people doing beautiful artwork. But what does it mean? What do these films, what will it give you?â
His forthcoming film, âKillers of the Flower Moon,â had been on Scorseseâs wish list for several years; itâs based on David Grannâs 2017 nonfiction book of the same name. He called the story âa sober look at who we are as a culture.â
The film tells the true story of the murders of Osage Nation members by white settlers in the 1920s. DiCaprio originally was attached to play FBI investigator Tom White, who was sent to the Osage Nation within Oklahoma to probe the killings. The script, however, underwent a significant rewrite.
âAfter a certain point,â the filmmaker told Time, âI realized I was making a movie about all the white guys.â
The dramatic focus shifted from Whiteâs investigation to the Osage and the circumstances that led to them being systematically killed with no consequences.
The character of White now is played by Jesse Plemons in a supporting role. DiCaprio stars as the husband of a Native American woman, Mollie Kyle (Lily Gladstone), an oil-rich Osage woman, and member of a conspiracy to kill her loved ones in an effort to steal her family fortune.
Scorsese worked closely with Osage Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear and his office from the beginning of production, consulting producer Chad Renfro told Time. On the first day of shooting, the Oscar-winning filmmaker had an elder of the nation come to set to say a prayer for the cast and crew.
Heâs forgetting movie historyâŠ
Back when television got big, cinema had to evolve to survive. The aspect ratio went wide.
This Is Cinerama was more of a tech demo than anything else in 1952, but it was followed by widescreen movie, movies in 1953 with âThe Robeâ being shot and shown in Cinemascope.
Technicolor too gave a more vibrant color scheme even than previous color film processing that actually came a generation prior, in 1932.
But the widescreen/Technicolor combination provided a must see experience that were the event films of the era and they couldnât be duplicated at home.
Roll forward 50 years⊠home theater technology has evolved to a point where theater has to compete with 65" 4K television displays and 7.1 Dolby Atmos surround sound. People need a reason to leave their homes and deal with noisy, disease infected, crowds, high concession prices, expensive tickets, and annoyances like having to pre-pick your own seats instead of just walking in and sitting down.
Streaming is keeping people at home, being able to binge long form content, pausing when necessary. Cinema canât provide that experirnce.
So itâs going the other way, the âtheme park ride experienceâ. It shouldnât be a surprise to anyone that the first Pirates of the Carribean movie hit in 2003, pre-dating the wave of comic book movies by, what? 5 or 6 years? 50 years after the first Cinerama movies?
But even that has roots going back to Jurassic Park (1993), Star Wars (1977), and Jaws (1975).
Now, donât get me wrong, I dearly love âsmallâ films like Scorseseâs After Hours, or even modern stuff like Wes Andersonâs Asteroid City, but there is ZERO compelling reason to see them in a theater. I can get the same experience viewing them on my home theater setup without, you know, blowing $50 to sit in a noisy, uncomfortable theater.
To do THAT, I NEED a spectacle. I need to see something that demands I see it right away, in a theatrical environment. It needs to be a theme park ride.
If your end goal is to make a tight knit drama full of people in rooms talking to each other, well, Downton Abbey and Bridgerton are over there ->
Pre-picking seats isnât annoying. You actually get your seats then, and if somebodyâs sat in them, you have discourse to get them out of them.
I have a generous sized TV and Atmos at home, but I still find myself going to the cinema at least once a week, someone 3 times a week depending on the release schedule. My cinema is even a shitty one with some screens having a bit shit audio (no longer as bad as it used to be though), but I still find myself going weekly. Thereâs just something about the cinema, along with seeing them during release times that canât be replicated at home.
Then again, Iâm also the kind of person who just doesnât like to binge anymore, itâs too much in one go. And with the cinema I have a card that allows me to only part the price of about 2 tickets a month to then see as many films I want in that month that I keep on subscription. Itâs much better than any streaming service option in my opinion. And occasionally when Iâm out of town I can also see a new film or one Iâve previously seen in a better cinema than my own line in IMAX or something.
Iâd be very sad for cinema to die out, moreso because I donât want to just consume everything on my couch. That feels like a lonely life to me.
Wow this is the first âpro-marvelâ response that actually put some thought into it, and while I donât personally agree youâve made the only compelling argument in this entire thread as to why these marvel movies being constantly regurgitated makes any sense.
Now, when it comes to âMarvel regurgitationâ, yeah, they could, and should, be doing better. They essentially re-use the same basic plot over and over again and will keep doing it until they hit one that doesnât make a billion dollars.
Iâm a lifelong comic book fan and I love that nerd culture is finally taking over, but I swear to god, I donât need another superhero movie where the hero and villain have a joined origin story and the villain is just a bigger, badder version of the hero.
Seriously.
Iron Man - Iron Monger
Incredible Hulk - Abomination
Iron Man 2 - Whiplash
Thor - Loki (both sons of Odin)
Captain America - Red Skull
Avengers - Loki + Alien Invasion
Iron Man 3 - Extremis
Thor: Dark World - Dark Elf invasion
Captain America: Winter Soldier - Bucky
Guardians of the Galaxy - Ronan - First one to break formula.
Avengers: Age of Ultron - Ultron joined origin with Vision.
Ant-Man - Yellow Jacket
Captain America: Civil War - Avengers vs. Avengers
Doctor Strange - Kaecilius
Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 - Peteâs Dad
Spider-Man: Homecoming - Vulture, Peteâs girlfriendâs dad.
Thor: Ragnarok - Hela, evil firstborn sister.
Black Panther - Killmonger
Avengers: Infinity War - Tying it all together.
Ant-Man and the Wasp - Ghost, a victim of Pym tech.
Captain Marvel - Yon-Rogg
Avengers: Endgame - Tying it all together.
Spider-Man: Far From Home - Mysterio (Stark Tech villain vs. Stark Tech hero)
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2 people + snacks, Iâm lucky if itâs ONLY $50.