Martin Scorsese: I Said Marvel Movies Aren't Cinema. Let Me Explain. (nytimes.com) 225
Martin Scorsese, writing at The New York Times: [...] In a way, certain Hitchcock films were also like theme parks. I'm thinking of "Strangers on a Train," in which the climax takes place on a merry-go-round at a real amusement park, and "Psycho," which I saw at a midnight show on its opening day, an experience I will never forget. People went to be surprised and thrilled, and they weren't disappointed. Sixty or 70 years later, we're still watching those pictures and marveling at them. But is it the thrills and the shocks that we keep going back to? I don't think so. The set pieces in "North by Northwest" are stunning, but they would be nothing more than a succession of dynamic and elegant compositions and cuts without the painful emotions at the center of the story or the absolute lostness of Cary Grant's character. The climax of "Strangers on a Train" is a feat, but it's the interplay between the two principal characters and Robert Walker's profoundly unsettling performance that resonate now.
Some say that Hitchcock's pictures had a sameness to them, and perhaps that's true -- Hitchcock himself wondered about it. But the sameness of today's franchise pictures is something else again. Many of the elements that define cinema as I know it are there in Marvel pictures. What's not there is revelation, mystery or genuine emotional danger. Nothing is at risk. The pictures are made to satisfy a specific set of demands, and they are designed as variations on a finite number of themes. They are sequels in name but they are remakes in spirit, and everything in them is officially sanctioned because it can't really be any other way. That's the nature of modern film franchises: market-researched, audience-tested, vetted, modified, revetted and remodified until they're ready for consumption.
[...] In the past 20 years, as we all know, the movie business has changed on all fronts. But the most ominous change has happened stealthily and under cover of night: the gradual but steady elimination of risk. Many films today are perfect products manufactured for immediate consumption. Many of them are well made by teams of talented individuals. All the same, they lack something essential to cinema: the unifying vision of an individual artist. Because, of course, the individual artist is the riskiest factor of all. [...] Today, that tension is gone, and there are some in the business with absolute indifference to the very question of art and an attitude toward the history of cinema that is both dismissive and proprietary -- a lethal combination. The situation, sadly, is that we now have two separate fields: There's worldwide audiovisual entertainment, and there's cinema. They still overlap from time to time, but that's becoming increasingly rare. And I fear that the financial dominance of one is being used to marginalize and even belittle the existence of the other. For anyone who dreams of making movies or who is just starting out, the situation at this moment is brutal and inhospitable to art. And the act of simply writing those words fills me with terrible sadness.
Some say that Hitchcock's pictures had a sameness to them, and perhaps that's true -- Hitchcock himself wondered about it. But the sameness of today's franchise pictures is something else again. Many of the elements that define cinema as I know it are there in Marvel pictures. What's not there is revelation, mystery or genuine emotional danger. Nothing is at risk. The pictures are made to satisfy a specific set of demands, and they are designed as variations on a finite number of themes. They are sequels in name but they are remakes in spirit, and everything in them is officially sanctioned because it can't really be any other way. That's the nature of modern film franchises: market-researched, audience-tested, vetted, modified, revetted and remodified until they're ready for consumption.
[...] In the past 20 years, as we all know, the movie business has changed on all fronts. But the most ominous change has happened stealthily and under cover of night: the gradual but steady elimination of risk. Many films today are perfect products manufactured for immediate consumption. Many of them are well made by teams of talented individuals. All the same, they lack something essential to cinema: the unifying vision of an individual artist. Because, of course, the individual artist is the riskiest factor of all. [...] Today, that tension is gone, and there are some in the business with absolute indifference to the very question of art and an attitude toward the history of cinema that is both dismissive and proprietary -- a lethal combination. The situation, sadly, is that we now have two separate fields: There's worldwide audiovisual entertainment, and there's cinema. They still overlap from time to time, but that's becoming increasingly rare. And I fear that the financial dominance of one is being used to marginalize and even belittle the existence of the other. For anyone who dreams of making movies or who is just starting out, the situation at this moment is brutal and inhospitable to art. And the act of simply writing those words fills me with terrible sadness.
Fair points (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd maybe quibble about the avoidance of risk being new - Hollywood really still doesn't know why one movie works and another fails (otherwise they'd not make the failure) and has long had the tendency to remake the last hit until it stops being a hit. What's maybe unusual is that superhero films have had a strong run for a while. but not, I would think, as long a run as westerns did back in the day.
Re:Fair points (Score:4, Interesting)
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Isn't that kind of hard to do when most of the seven die in the movie? (oops forgot to put in a spoiler tag)
Also the movie was remade in 2017 and I haven't heard of any spin offs yet. 8^)
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There were still sequels... "The Return of the Magnificent Seven" (1966), and "The Magnificent Seven Ride" (1972).
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Yes they did, BUT...that was a few years back, before the "everything diversity" really kicked into gear.
You remake it starting tomorrow, and then I stand by my previous statement.
craft versus art: elevating the soul (Score:5, Interesting)
He saying they are made with craft, and the artisans make it extraordinary dynamic and visual but that as far as literature and story telling go it's not art. It doesn't surprise, it is like myth and canon where there is a formula that can be epic without leading someone to new thoughts and emotions.
He's basically right in the characterization. Where one draws the line between Art and craft can be hard. Personally, I am filled with elevated feelings when I'm in a Frank Lloyd Wright building. I like traveling through Dulles just for that. And the Bauhaus style was a design aesthetic that some people found spiritual, perhaps like a consumer version of Zen simplicity. It's what Apple strives for. Can a consumer pleasing item be art?
But he's also wrong. If you go back and look at the comic books. Many of these are clearly visual art. THe stories are not. So the question is do the movies retain that visual art?
THings like Sin City and Revolver have tried to really bear down on the black and white nature to make you see the lighting and perspectives and composition more. I think they are very effective and I love to watch these visuals. Movies can be painting with light or stylistic composition. Here's an example of a terrible movie in the comic book vein that is visually a compositional masterwork: Sucker Punch. Or consider the movie "The Fall".
So comic book movies can easily rise to art. But that's not what the Marvel movies are striving for. They are simply great entertainment. I'm totally satisfied by them. Just like I am by Blackberry Ice cream. Things don't have to be Art to be good.
I think the key thing then is that Art inspires or elevates the soul just a bit.
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But he's also wrong. If you go back and look at the comic books. Many of these are clearly visual art. THe stories are not. So the question is do the movies retain that visual art?
THings like Sin City and Revolver have tried to really bear down on the black and white nature to make you see the lighting and perspectives and composition more. I think they are very effective and I love to watch these visuals. Movies can be painting with light or stylistic composition. Here's an example of a terrible movie in the comic book vein that is visually a compositional masterwork: Sucker Punch. Or consider the movie "The Fall".
So comic book movies can easily rise to art. But that's not what the Marvel movies are striving for. They are simply great entertainment. I'm totally satisfied by them. Just like I am by Blackberry Ice cream. Things don't have to be Art to be good.
I think the key thing then is that Art inspires or elevates the soul just a bit.
I don't think he's saying that they can't be "cinema", by definition, just that the recent Marvell/DC stuff isn't.
Because they're all planned around creating an endless stream of movies from their "cinematic universe" to ensure consistent revenue flow to Disney, not because somebody came up with a great story to tell.
Of course Hollywood is business, but you can clearly see the difference between a Scorsese or Tarantino movie and most comic films.
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Probably because they cost more to make than they bring in profit.
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With streaming services it doesn't really make sense to make one shot movies. For a starter you need to compress a story line into ~2hrs for a movie. Most stories really aren't suited to such time constraints. Secondly, the streaming services need to keep their subscribers which is easier to do with a series than with a one and done movie.
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Now we could say he's just miffed that he couldn't get a mainstream theatrical release for his new film, but I agree with him, that's weird for a Scorsese/DeNiro/Pacino film.
Re:Fair points (Score:5, Interesting)
Not that he doesn’t have a point... but it’s not anything new. Eighty years ago some of the most popular pictures featured Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers - all of which featured the same basic silly story line and banter.
I really enjoy those old Astaire & Rogers movies, but by Scorsese’s metric they probably “weren’t cinema” either.
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Danny Kaye basically did 23 reiterations of the same story.
Re:Fair points (Score:4, Insightful)
But they were cinema. Just at a different level. Leaving aside the incredible dancing and music, there's a scene in one of them where the silly Edward Everett Horton character sees something shocking - and the next shot is a pan of him lying on the floor. He obviously fainted in between, but the director chose to leave that out, and the result is hilarious - pure visual storytelling. It doesn't have to be big and flashy to be art.
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So let me get this straight, a jump-cut is what makes it cinema?
Hell, by your measure, the episode of the X-Files where Mulder shows a teeny-tiny miniature insect-shaped machine to a machine researcher who thinks he's going to look at a bug and sees his whole life's work superseded, followed by Mulder and the researcher sitting together with a couple of half-drank glasses and an open bottle is cinema.
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Yep. If deployed cleverly - and if it hasn't been done that way before. By the time the X-Files came along, jump cuts were a cliche. That's not to say the X-files didn't have other stuff going for it. Anything can become a cliche. It's why that 'Jackson Pollock' your kid made with the chocolate syrup isn't art. Feel free to be entertained by it - but don't rag on Scorcese just because he cares about the art of cinema.
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I like some of the older musicals, but damn, they sure liked making movies about making movies, or making movies about making stage shows, or making movies about touring acts.
True on so many fronts (Score:5, Insightful)
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I agree that the current craze is to see how much action they can get on the screen at one time. The size of the battles are (IMHO) actually overkill now, having more characters in a battle actually dilutes the story and I guess I'm just becoming numb to CGI.
Re:True on so many fronts (Score:4, Interesting)
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Older movies moved slower, with less excitement, but you really got to know the characters, and when the movie ended, you wondered what happened to them next. We've lost that, and I miss it.
Netflix's "The Highwaymen" is an old-school movie. Slower-paced, good character development, less focus on pew pew. Still plenty of it, but not like a modern cops n' robbers flick. I highly recommend it if you like film.
Re:True on so many fronts (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with Scorsese's assessment - movie making today is about the thrills, the special effects, the CGI, the car crashes, etc. I first recognized this in Peter Jackson's adaptation of Lord of the Rings. Those films were epic, and deserved every award they got. BUT - the stories were modified to focus so much on the battles, that we lost a lot of the characterizations and interactions that made the books what they were.
This is the real change to cinema, not what Scorsese's going on about. It's not about "risk aversion", which is nothing new, it's about watching movies at home. Unless a movie is a special effects explosion spectacular, why see it on a big screen? The home viewing experience is otherwise superior. The potential audience for a drama or a comedy at a movie theater is just too small these days - people want to watch those at home.
People still like dramas and comedies and think pieces and so on, but they'd just rather watch them at home. The small-budget non-action movie is gradually disappearing - but only from the theater. Netflix and Amazon and all the rest are trying to figure out how to make those again. We'll see a resurgence of all the genres other than "screen explosions and punching" soon enough, once the streaming studios grow up.
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Maybe. But try comparing, say, "Lawrence of Arabia" or "2001 - A Space Odyssey" on a big screen vs. at home. This problem isn't new - television was supposed to kill the movies, but they responded by making the big screen experience more compelling. Today, the difference is less pronounced, but it's still there.
I'd say people don't prefer to stay at home and watch Netflix. But the movie theater experience has become less compelling - and more of an ordeal. Tickets are way too expensive, they blast you
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This is the real change to cinema, not what Scorsese's going on about. It's not about "risk aversion", which is nothing new, it's about watching movies at home. Unless a movie is a special effects explosion spectacular, why see it on a big screen? The home viewing experience is otherwise superior. The potential audience for a drama or a comedy at a movie theater is just too small these days - people want to watch those at home.
Completely disagree with this. It's not about explosions, I think the difference is exactly between "cinema" in the sense that Scorsese means it and just random movies. The last film I went to watch was Once Upon a Time in Hollywood an it was a great experience, definitely enhanced by seeing it at the theater. There's a few fights and some fire, but no major action going on. Yet I sat there for 2.5 hours just soaking in the atmosphere of the 60s Hollywood and enjoying every frame of it, focused on the story
Re:True on so many fronts (Score:4, Insightful)
Not only that, but they degraded meaning in order to sell their orc battles. Boromir died because he succumbed to lust for power, and his father because he gave in to fear, and gave up. But Faramir was worthy because he resigned himself to serving his people as best he could, and resisted the lure of power. But Jackson's bastardization threw that lesson in the fire (where, unlike The Ring, it burned away to nothingness) for the sake of a little more peril for the ring bearer, and in doing so let one of the finest lines in the whole epic fall to the floor. I'm paraphrasing, but he said "Not even if I found this thing by the side of the road would I take it." Jackson instead turned him into Boromir part II. Of all the changes in the whole trilogy, that was the one that pissed me off the most, more than any dwarf-tossing or Mumakil-surfing.
In fact, I disliked it so much, I haven't seen The Hobbit. Has anyone edited that down to the proper story yet?
Re:True on so many fronts (Score:5, Funny)
I think there's a fan edit that got it down to 6 1/2 hours.
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You know what? There was a previous era in which complaints were levied against the new changes in filmmaking. Actors like Cary Grant stopped acting when the productions became, "too real."
Lots of movies early on basically were set in the studio, in the sense that the entire world in the movie had a degree of artificiality. Movie sets and structure flowed like stage productions, where the sets and scenes lacked a certain definition. To see this, pull out a movie made from the mid-seventies onward, say s
Tough shit Marty (Score:2)
People aren't going to the theater for the artistry. This industry is, and always has been, about popular entertainment. That studios are willing to put up with the artistic whims of directors doesn't mean the audience is particularly keen when they take their four kids and dog to their local dollarplex.
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Celebrities (Score:2, Interesting)
Why do you care what celebrities say about anything?
Context (Score:5, Informative)
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I can't tell Marvel productions apart (Score:3, Interesting)
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They all seem like one continuous blur to me where I can't tell where one ends and the other begins. I haven't even watched them all either, but I have watched almost all of them, sadly.
Almost exactly like the comics then. The problem with Marvel and DC and Dark Horse etc is that to move the story forward with super natural characters you have to continuously up the ante. You saved the world int he last book so this time you have to save the galaxy, then the universe, then the multi-verse and on and on.Then you have to reboot the whole thing and do it again.
At some point it all becomes the same story, just replace the characters and draw some pretty new pictures. The medium is dying.
Re:I can't tell Marvel productions apart (Score:5, Insightful)
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--A competent team can make the story to save a *single village* compelling.
/ or person
target (Score:2, Interesting)
It's great that some movies advance the art (and in the beginning, pretty much everything advanced the art by definition), but the purpose of many movies is to bring in money by pleasing a sufficiently large group of moviegoers.
If they do that by tapping into some teen angst over powerlessness or whatever is apparently not Scorsese's thing then he is simply not the target audience.
He should not blame the movie for knowing its audience and appeasing it. What he is really saying is that he doesn't respect the
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I don't know if he's just talking about attitudes, or his ability to afford talent like De Niro since he can make so much money on Meet the Fockers type movies, or what
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The end of the 60's was Peak Westerns.
The end of the 70's was Peak Car Chasing.
The end of the 80's was Peak Science Fiction Horror.
Yeah, well (Score:5, Insightful)
Martin,
I don't think we give a fuck. The Marvel movies reliably deliver what we're looking for. Definitely not high art, often predictable to the point where it is a built-in joke, and couldn't stand on its own without the special effects. But they deliver a quality product consistently. "Cinema" is pretty hit or miss, by which I mean more miss than hit honestly. Given the cost of a trip to the movies both in dollars and the more precious resource of time, that's not an acceptable trade. I usually give this stuff a try on Netflix where there isn't really a penalty for watching any given thing. I've seen so many shitty Netflix Original movies that even a failed art-house movie might be welcome sometimes, if the studios didn't have a hard on for bashing Netflix. That's probably your real enemy right now: people can't watch your movies because the people who own them don't like to share.
Go on and make the shit you want to make, but I don't think you ought to count on getting rich for it. The phrase "starving artist" exists for a reason. It has a place in the world, but it's probably never going to be the first choice. A few people will watch it, they'll tell a few others if it was any good. Eventually, over years, people might realize a diamond had been in the rough the whole time. But it's not going to be the box office buster that The Avengers XXXIV will be.
Re:Yeah, well (Score:4, Insightful)
"The Marvel movies reliably deliver what we're looking for."
But..what is that? What are you looking for? It is just safe meaningless drivel. Is that what you are looking for?
Re:Yeah, well (Score:5, Insightful)
Is is cinema? Who cares! If it appeals to you go watch it. If it doesn't, go watch something else that does. I haven't been watching any of the Marvel releases for years now, but I don't feel as though there's been a dearth of good films that I actually enjoy. Maybe the studios or others aren't looking to beat me over the head with the knowledge of their existence, but a little effort on my own part has given me more movies I'd probably enjoy watching than I have time to watch all of them.
Speak for yourself (Score:2)
Speak for yourself. I think his piece is accurate.
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Quality is in the eye of the beholder. I'd get more satisfaction wiping my ass with a ticket for a superhero movie than watching it.
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Who's this "we?" The masses? The masses voted Taco Bell best Mexican restaurant. Maybe if the human lifespan doubles, and the onset of senility is pushed back accordingly, we'll live long enough for the masses to exhibit wisdom. But today? Crap wins out if it's sufficiently shiny. And it's clearly possible to polish a turd, if you keep it in the freezer long enough. Even most movies which aren't direct remakes are copies of one of a bare handful of plots.
Marvel movies are making money, but in even a decade
Re:Yeah, well (Score:5, Insightful)
You've missed Martin's point. The very best movies deliver what you weren't looking for. What you didn't even realize you wanted--or needed.
Re:Yeah, well (Score:5, Funny)
Translation: ...
I don't think we give a fuck. Masturbation reliably delivers what we're looking for. Definitely not love, often predictable to the point where it is a built-in joke, and couldn't stand on its own without the porn. But they deliver a quality product consistently. "Dating" is pretty hit or miss, by which I mean more miss than hit honestly. Given the cost of a date both in dollars and the more precious resource of time, that's not an acceptable trade. I usually give this stuff a try on Tinder where there isn't really a penalty for just seeing if somebody's dtf. I've had so many bad tinder dates that even a failed date
Etc.
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Go on and make the shit you want to make, but I don't think you ought to count on getting rich for it. The phrase "starving artist" exists for a reason.
Martin Scorsese already got rich for the "shit" he's made. He's widely considered to be one of the best directors of all time. He has the most Best Director nominations of any living director, also having won at least one Oscar, Golden Globe, Emmy, and BAFTA award for directing. His movies, taken together, have grossed more than $1.9 billion. Three of them are on the list of the AFI's hundred greatest movies ever made.
I mean, it's fine if you prefer Marvel movies. And box office receipts for Marvel movies a
Amen to that... (Score:2)
I think he might be painting with too wide a brush (Score:5, Interesting)
If that were really the case then the latest Terminator movie wouldn't have been the box office bomb that it was.
OTOH, he just finished a movie that none of the major studios wanted to do, so perhaps he is expressing how modern Hollywood is reacting to his movies.
Difference between an artist and an artisan (Score:5, Insightful)
Marvel movies are made by artisans. People who are very skilled at making a product the customer wants.
An artist is someone who makes what he or she wants. Are they technically skilled? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. However, they don't cater to the masses either.
Art you can fall deeply in love with depending on how well it speaks to you. Artisanship has its own beauty but not the same depth, usually.
I'd say Van Gogh was an artist but perhaps not a very good artisan. Michelangelo might have been a genius artisan but not that much of an artist, depending on which of his works you judge.
The important fact to remember is that these things have completely different sets of clientele and purpose. While they sometimes may overlap, perhaps only to certain individuals even, usually they are just not comparable.
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New Scorsese Movie out!! (Score:5, Funny)
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Oh look, it's about organized crime. Just like every other Scorsese movie.
Meh. You write what you know. Most directors do this, Spielberg, Cameron, Tarantino. That's fine if each iteration is different and feels new. I think Scorsese mostly accomplishes that. If you look at his IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm00... [imdb.com] you can see he branches out quite a lot but as a producer and not a director.
Marvel movies are like Halloween candy (Score:2)
Scorsese's criticism of these movies is spot on.
Halloween is on my mind so I will make a dessert analogy. They are extremely well-made corporate creations, kind of like Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. He's acknowledging that science and craft, while advocating for a proper soufflé.
I quite like eating the peanut butter cups. But the soufflé has its place and he's lamenting that soufflés are hard to find now.
I'm confused (Score:2)
I'm confused... why does he need to explain?!
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I'm confused... why does he need to explain?!
He doesn't need to, he wants to. And his initial statements have garnered enough attention that he can do so, and have people discuss his explanation. I submit as evidence this slashdot story, and subsequent discussion.
So he can't see past the costumes? (Score:2)
He can't see the people, he sees the costumes, which is pretty common.
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I am curious about that. I really enjoyed the X-Men trilogy but not so much the other Marvel movies. Moreover I really enjoyed the X-Men trilogy once, I found them to be not very watchable a second time.
I suspect Its because I went into those movies with childhood memories of enjoying the comics and existing familiarity with the characters, the origin story elements of the films alone don't entirely provide. I can't say I thought much of any of the Avengers works. Interestingly I never read a lot of those c
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Gang stories: Gangs of New York, Dueces Wild, The Departed.
Mob stories: Mean Streets, Goodfellas, Casino, The Family.
Hustler movies: The Wolf of Wall Street, The Color of Money, Clockers, The Grifters.
These are just the ones I quickly came up with from looking at the movie names on IMDB - many of his movies I havent seen but I suspect there are a lot more criminal-focused movies.
Seems like he is iterating over the same story themes also.
Blame US Studios (Score:2)
Foreign films are often different. And better as a result of it. If you want a good example of how the US studio system screws up movies, get the 3 DVD set of Brazil. Watch the director's cut. Then the studio cut. The third disc is a set of interviews outlining the fight between Terry Gilliam (director) and the studio about how they butchered the movie before releasing it.
The word is: Formulaic (Score:4, Interesting)
1. Modern movies are extremely formulaic:
X% of romance, Y% of action, Z% of humor. Predictable First, Second, and Third Acts. Formulaic to a T.
e.g. Avatar was basically a retelling of Dances With Wolves.
They generally have to formulaic be because most movies are extremely expensive to make and it is all about risk management. (Crazy hollywood accounting shenanigans none the less.) Look at Titantic -- you even KNEW the outcome beforehand but still people went to see it.
2. Yes, they ARE cinema. "Low brow" cinema, where little thinking is involved because deep thinking movies are rarely as popular as dumb action flicks but they still are cinema. The same way "pop music" is still technically music, or "fast food" is still food.
Yes, Quantity != Quality, but they are still the same CATEGORY.
How many times has Robin Hood been remade [wikipedia.org] ???
3. YOU don't get to decide if certain movies aren't cinema just because they are "shallow" or "pulpy".
Who defines good cinema? You?
Take Baraka. It has no plot, no characters, no dialog but yet it still has themes. It is one of the most beautiful movies ever made but it would be considered a snore fest in the modern world because kids don't know to just Live and Be in the moment.
Who gives a fuck what other people think about ART?!
4. Movies, like any other form of entertainment have multiple purposes:
* To make money
* To be a fun escape
* To wrap thematic introspection and social narrative in a more digestible form
* As a barometer of Spirituality and the developmental level of Mass Consciousness because humans are one of the species in the galaxy as First Contact in 2030 will show.
To whine that "Not all art is great!!" misses the point of WHY art is made in the first place.
The debate of Why the commercialization of Art is not "True Art" is as old as the hills. No one gives a fuck anymore.
As said in Gladiator:
"Were you not entertained!?"
Old Man Yells At Cloud.gif (Score:3)
Old Man Yells At Cloud.gif
Marvel lost me a decade ago (Score:2)
Marvel is like Sam Adams beer, great, but polished (Score:2)
However, I also love that at my local Liquor store, I can buy rarer craft beers if I wanted to...I usually don't but hey, I like the option. Martin stated it well and respectful. I've seen every Marvel movie released I look forward to watching them and have a great time, but that's because a huge team focus-tested every little joke and interaction and special
Not _Cinema_ maybe but certainly is Entertainment (Score:4, Interesting)
Scorsese is 100% correct, but where he goes off the radar is thinking that people exclusively go to the movies to see a masterpiece in "Cinema". That couldn't be more false. Sometimes, people just want to be entertained. Entertainment is a much lower bar.
But that's how it is with anything produced for mass-consumption. I love a good quality single malt scotch, but a lot of times, a plain old beer is just fine. F1 races are technically amazing and a wonderful experience. But NASCAR and Monster Truck jams are equally entertaining. Can't the same be said for pretty much everything?
What I really want to understand is why the older people get... they seem to fall into this same tired pattern of thinking. And we all swear we'll never do it when we reach that age... but invariably... it seems to happen to all of us. We all end up saying the same crap. Over and over again. Generation after generation.
Ya know (Score:2)
Nothing New (Score:2)
It's cinema: Look at the source material (Score:3)
What's missing in Scorsese's argument is a proper treatment of the source material for the Marvel movies. They are based on _comic books_. As a life long reader of comics and fan of film, I appreciate how the Marvel movies have been handled. They respect the storytelling and character development methods from comics.
Mainstream comics are designed to be somewhat throwaway at the level of the individual issue. The real stories play out over entire series as complex worlds and characters are built. I'd argue that this is exactly what the Marvel movie franchises have done. Rather than cheapened cinema, they've introduced a new, expanded language for telling stories across multiple films. They've even borrowed that comic tradition of "re-boots" when story lines are exhausted in the current timeline yet the fan base would like more stories.
Storytelling mediums evolve and borrow from other mediums. That's all that's happened here.
In other news... (Score:3)
He's right. (Score:2)
I tend to fiddle with my phone or laptop during most of the Marvel universe films. (Note: We always watch the DVDs as there's no way we'd drop big bucks to watch one of these things in a theater. And lately, we wait for them to arrive at the public library so we don't even have to spend even $2-$3 for a rental.) Frankly, there's only so much "Oooh! Special effects! Things blow up! Endless mayhem!" one can muster before these films become repetitive and bo-r-r-ring!
If Scorsese is making a distinction betwe
Drivel (Score:3)
Man says something isn't art because it's not "good" art... then needs to clarify his definition of "good."
Film at 11.
Re:Martin Scorsese: "It's not cinema unless I did (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Martin Scorsese: "It's not cinema unless I did (Score:4, Insightful)
Complex? The Wolf of Wall Street is complex?
Not even 'more complex' than any Marvel film. Yes, yes, the Marvel universe is already plotted out in comics, so all you need is to visualize it in 3D, run the effects, and boom. But The Wolf of Wall Street is indeed mostly lowbrow humor - boiler rooms, stock churn, and all manner of excess is no more than tabloid filler, most of which isn't even new. It's set when, the 80s? The great appeal is the cast and memorable scenes that earn the 'R' rating. titillating.
Virtually no artistic difference, to me, between The Wolf of Wall Street and Avengers:Endgame, save that Endgame sets the stage for either a reboot or development of new story universes, while I'm not sure where you go with a brokers behaving badly story except HBO. Without a throne.
Bu then I enjoyed Jupiter Ascending, and wish they had continued the 1984 Dune movie into at least one more book. And Ender's Game, just one more book.
Re: Martin Scorsese: "It's not cinema unless I did (Score:2)
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Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)
Pretentious? I don't think you know what that word means.
His basic claim is that Marvel movies are safe experiences due to market testing caused by the massive budgets that must be recouped, and therefore they are not thrilling.
That is a clear argument, and certainly not one depending on any affectations or supposed position from on high.
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Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem with Marvel films isn't that they're not 'complex' or don't have compelling characters. It's that they're structured like video games. There's a dramatic setup, which accounts for maybe the first third of the film - and where all the interest lies. And then the CGI takes over, and it's pure action. The problem with that is that in a video game, you're part of the action - so there's something at least potentially compelling going on, if only because you're involved. In a video game style movie, you're just being taken on a thrill ride, and well, y'know, you can't replicate an original thrill. You can add twists and intensify the action, but it's all a game of diminishing returns.
Now if you want to see what the art of cinema looks like, watch the scene from "The Birds" where Tippi Hedren is driving up the coast highway with a pair of lovebirds in a cage on the floor of her sportscar. The thrill of Hitchcock communicating something strictly through a visual image is palpable. That movie is full of 'em...
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By this kind of reasoning, only a few movies every year are cinema.
This is literally the epitome of a no-true-scotsman defense.
And at the same time, citing a movie that isn't a sequel and has no sequel when comparing to a film series arguably is all sequels since 2008 is comparing apples and oranges. I've very much enjoyed some movies that were never meant to have sequels. I've enjoyed some movies that were never meant to have sequels but they've managed to make them anyway, even if I didn't like the sequ
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)
Sequels aren't the problem (okay, they're part of the problem, if they're completely devoid of imagination). Neither is the fact that most movies aren't ART.
For me, 30 minutes of impossible CGI action isn't storytelling. It isn't even action. It's just stimulation, and it adds up to next to nothing. That even in a movie that started out promising. I've generally liked the first 30 minutes of every comic book movie I've seen. But once the video game kicks in, there's a sameness to it all - and a disorientation, to the point that you don't even know what you're looking at - only that it's 'exciting'. Movies can be so much better than that.
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)
By this kind of reasoning, only a few movies every year are cinema.
Yep, you got it in one. That's how it is, assuming there's even a few.
That doesn't mean the other movies aren't worth making, or even seeing, but it does mean they'll vanish in the sands of time.
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"The problem with that is that in a video game, you're part of the action - so there's something at least potentially compelling going on, if only because you're involved. In a video game style movie, you're just being taken on a thrill ride, and well, y'know, you can't replicate an original thrill. You can add twists and intensify the action, but it's all a game of diminishing returns."
Sorry that just sounds like a preference for Drama over Action in film and that is purely a matter of taste. Just because
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I have nothing against action films. I've enjoyed many of them. Hell, Jaws still works for me.
But the sameness of CGI action - swooping impossible camera angles, etc. Combined with supposed 'edge of your seat suspense' (Spielberg jumped the shark when that car fell out of the tree in Jurassic Park with an open window placed just so so that kids survived having it fall on them), it all just feels manipulative. Just because it gets your pulse pounding doesn't mean it's really engaging you. I dare you to
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...The biggest issue I see in most drama films is they don't have any of that action at all. Nothing actually happens, they just get caught in a loop of character development...[nothing] distinguishes them from drama you might get just talking to regular people and hearing the crap life feeds us... not one you'd pay theater prices for.
Quote sniping for how I would characterize the situation as mainly a pricing issue. Hollywood refuses to acknowledge their flat-rate pricing structure pushes customers to favor action movies. Seeing a movie in the theater is expensive, but at least action films take full advantage of all the visual and sound technology available. A drama loses little if one waits to see it at home, and at $14 per theater seat I'm not even considering going to the theater for a drama.
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Interesting)
Pretentious? I don't think you know what that word means.
His basic claim is that Marvel movies are safe experiences due to market testing caused by the massive budgets that must be recouped, and therefore they are not thrilling.
That is a clear argument, and certainly not one depending on any affectations or supposed position from on high.
Yep,
The gist of it is that he's saying that Marvel movies are formulaic and that wont change as long as the formula is making money. Its basically like the McDonalds of movie making, you go to McDonalds because you know exactly what you're going to get no matter which McDonalds you go to even if it's in a completely different country. Ergo with Marvel movies, they need to maximise the appeal to the widest possible audience, this means taking as few risks as possible.
It's not pretentious to criticise McDonalds for being what it is, likewise it's not pretentious to criticise Marvel movies for being what they are.
I think of Marvel movies as "aeroplane movies" because when you're on a long haul flight for 10+ hours what you want to do is simply switch off your brain for a few hours, Marvel and other superhero movies fit that bill perfectly. No substance but lots of flashy CGI fight scenes and eye candy, brain can take a 2-3 hour holiday. In fact I'm pretty sure I haven't seen a marvel movie outside an aircraft in some years.
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Saying that Marvel movies are safe is really underselling the work of the people producing them (in particular Kevin Feige). If it were as simple as following a specific formula and throwing in some spectacular CGI then Hollywood would be cranking out equally successful blockbusters constantly. And yet when we see other studios and franchises trying it they frequently fail (see flops like Solo, Shazaam, various Terminator sequels, etc...).
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:4, Interesting)
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Is that what "There's worldwide audiovisual entertainment, and there's cinema." sounds like to you? Because to me it sounds exactly like when Roger Ebert said that video games can never be art. IE, it sounds pretentious.
That's funny, because whenever I see the word pretentious, especially when applied to a sound argument, I really imagine that the speaker is putting his or fingers in his or her ears, and saying "nanananana I can't hear you...."
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)
The difference is that Roger Ebert wrote about movies. He had a column every single day. He was paid for his opinions and his opinions often changed.
On the other hand, Martin Scorsese has already made over 40 movies, most of which will still be watched and enjoyed and studied 40 years from now. Do you really think anyone's going to be watching AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON 40 years from now? Or will more up-to-date entertainments be made that will replace it?
What was the last time you went out of your way to watch 2008's THE INCREDIBLE HULK? But a little-known Scorsese film like MEAN STREETS (1973) will still fill revival houses with paying customers. RAGING BULL or GOODFELLAS could get a new release in 2019 and fill theaters.
There's nothing wrong with superhero movies. I love superhero movies. But they are indisputably disposable schlock.
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maybe, but remember that any useful definition of art has to include bad art
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:4, Interesting)
Over the past decade (or more), I've seen countless comments complaining that Hollywood simply recycles ideas and intellectual property looking for a quick buck. The stories may be good, the effects look great, and the acting is decent... but there is still a hollowness to many of the movies. Where is the development? What about the creativity, the originality?
I can watch a new movie now and enjoy it.. in many cases have a pretty good idea of how things will end. The movie studios have a formula they know works, and they stick to it.
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It's pretentious to assume that his generation of directors were in it only for the art. They were in it for the money. They happened to be good at the art at times too, but make no mistake, they were there to make money for themselves.
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Is it pretentious to want to create pictures as art, as money of his generation of directors did, rather than slop dished out to the masses which seems barely more than the big 'marvel' type movies are. You could cut an paste the films from one to another and it would barely change them.
Money? Yup, that slip up just about covers it.
Old man is mad that others in his field make more money than him.
Re:Pretentious Fuck (Score:5, Funny)
I say it is not, sir!