Scorsese and Coppola on "superhero" films

The whole debate is sort of funny to me because big FX vehicles have always prioritized spectacle over drama and theme. Superhero films are just a more extreme example. I don't like how they are sucking the oxygen out of the industry and crowding out other types of films. And I don't respect them as an artform or particularly enjoy them myself. But it seems silly to say that they are "not cinema."
 
ahalpert said:
I don't like how they are sucking the oxygen out of the industry and crowding out other types of films.
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This is the root of the issue. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I think what really has gotten under Scorsese and Coppola's skin, and why they have objected so strongly to "Marvel type" films is that they've colonized the theatrical release business. There's not any room at all for bigger budgeted adult oriented fare of the type Coppola and Scorsese made their names on, and they've felt that. The economics just aren't there any more. It's so expensive to make and market a wide release movie you basically have to make a mass appeal theme park movie to make a significant profit. There are some other profitable genres (namely horror) that can be done on a low budget, but for the most part this limits your gross, and it can be argued they are just another type of "ride" move built primarily on spectacle. Streaming and cable has a different economic model which is why the action for high quality dramatic material has shifted there. Streaming survives on repeat business, and the only reliable way to do that is to keep supplying good content. A film only has to be enticing enough to lure enough people into the theater once, so they jam pack it with sensational stuff that looks great in a trailer, not caring much about the quality of the rest of it. You can't do that with a TV series. It has to have good stories and interesting characters or people will stop watching. And they need to keep you watching. If you leave halfway through a theater release, the studio doesn't care, because they already gots your money.
 
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Which is why the "Irishman" is a mixed theaters + Netflix release. The production costs were very high but Netflix can contain the outlays on marketing or use film marketing as the service marketing.
 
DLD said:
Which is why the "Irishman" is a mixed theaters + Netflix release. The production costs were very high but Netflix can contain the outlays on marketing or use film marketing as the service marketing.
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I can probably guess that the only reason they did a theatrical release was because Scorsese demanded it in his contract. Other than qualifying for the Oscars there isn't much financial incentive for them to do so.
 
It seems to me that occasionally the Scorseses and Coppolas forget that the industry they're in is for-profit, and that Oscars are that for-profit industry giving awards to itself, not gold stars at art camp.

For a time, what they did was profitable. Things change.

Are they right about the art? Maybe. But Big Film isn't about art and never has been, except as an exploitable niche market.

Perhaps the time will come again when what they do captures the movie-going dollars. Perhaps it won't.

But I can tell you this -- the only thing that gets me into a theater these days is something worthy of 100 feet of screen, and that the audience will shut up and watch. If I want something contemplative, the better place by far is my own movie room at home.
 
"But I can tell you this -- the only thing that gets me into a theater these days is something worthy of 100 feet of screen, and that the audience will shut up and watch. If I want something contemplative, the better place by far is my own movie room at home."
I grew up in nyc and worked at all the revival houses as a young man. I went to see the Joker recently - just to see what all the jabber was about. By the time the film started I was exhausted from the trailers and commercials. Back in the day when they started to play commercials - i would boo. Some peeps joined - most didn't. I watched Local Hero last night - a fav of mine. And I miss those times of watching a film like that with an audience. Frankly Scorsese and his pals are some of the main causes of this type of filmmaking. Scorsese couldn't show a family having breakfast without the camera being flung thru the damn window and it bouncing off the walls. The famous scene in Goodfellas with "I'm funny to you?" Scorsese wouldn't shut up about it for years. "Just 2 shots. Simple." As if he was suddenly Bella Tarr. Anyway - random thoughts before my coffee. ps - Scorsese would always say "I'm the type of filmmaker who wants to put a ring in yer nose and have ya look at this and that. I don't want you roaming around making yer own movie." Like Hitchcock. Hey I love his movies - but I know on my death bed his images will not be flickering away in the old noggin, but Tarkovsky, Ray, Fellini, Leigh, Cassavettes, Forsyth, etc. The humanist who left me alone in the dark.
 
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ahalpert said:
The whole debate is sort of funny to me because big FX vehicles have always prioritized spectacle over drama and theme. Superhero films are just a more extreme example. I don't like how they are sucking the oxygen out of the industry and crowding out other types of films. And I don't respect them as an artform or particularly enjoy them myself. But it seems silly to say that they are "not cinema."
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I agree.

This has happened before. In 1983 William Goldman said that movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark were comic-book movies. His taste was all the more inscrutable because he said his favorite movie was Gunga Din. I started to watch it and saw little difference.

I love Raiders, but I also love heavy dramas like Dead Man Walking and Smoke. I always thought of them as different genres of cinema, not that some were cinema and some not.

I don't enjoy most of the Marvel movies, except for the first Iron Man. I recently watched the latest Spider-Man movie and thought it was wretched. But I would never say it was not cinema.
 
Leave it to Martin to state the obvious. No shinola Sherlock. They're based on comics and made for kids and young adults. He has had more than his day in the sun. To be picking on those films because he can't get wide distribution for his movie is low class and desperate.
 
Paul F said:
To be picking on those films because he can't get wide distribution for his movie is low class and desperate.
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I don't think he was looking to pick a fight. He was asked his opinion on them in an interview, gave it, and since then has had to defend it and explain his stance more fully.
 
Batutta said:
I can probably guess that the only reason they did a theatrical release was because Scorsese demanded it in his contract. Other than qualifying for the Oscars there isn't much financial incentive for them to do so.
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Once the film is made, it's sunk cost, so Netflix's aim to is max out its revenues. Big chains won't carry it because the window between the theater premiere and the streaming is only four weeks. But, given that the Irishman is Scorcese's best reviewed film - at least, according to the Guardian - there'll be lines around the block whenever the film plays. In the general sense, 80%-90% of the movie domestic gross comes from its first three weeks in theaters anyway, so the four week window, rather than a typical thirteen, should suffice.

As to the traditional comic strips, they've historically followed a traditional three act narrative. The 1978 "Superman" (Richard Donner) and the "Stars Wars" trilogy all followed this format. What Scorsese alludes to in his remark was that most modern superhero films stripped themselves of the character development and any philosophic undertones that was present in the past.

PS. Crispin Glover is also wrong, since in the 1930's, the US was not a "global policeman".
 
DLD said:
PS. Crispin Glover is also wrong, since in the 1930's, the US was not a "global policeman".
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He didn't say that...He said the comics were propaganda that supported the war effort in the 40's, and that has been extruded to today, where they are supporting our role as "the world's policemen", and I suggest this is as far as we discuss this to not run afoul of the mods.
 
I'll give Scorsese one thing: he started an intetesting conversation on this forum.

PS I loved this statement from Kevin Baggott:

kevin baggott said:
"Hey I love his movies - but I know on my death bed his images will not be flickering away in the old noggin, but Tarkovsky, Ray, Fellini, Leigh, Cassavettes, Forsyth, etc. The humanist who left me alone in the dark.
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Batutta said:
He didn't say that...He said the comics were propaganda that supported the war effort in the 40's, and that has been extruded to today, where they are supporting our role as "the world's policemen", and I suggest this is as far as we discuss this to not run afoul of the mods.
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The 1930's were very hard economically, so comics were a lighthearted attempt at improving the mood around the country. In the 1950's, they reflected the geopolitical situation, where the supervillains were thinly disguised US antagonists bent on the global domination, not much different from the villains in the James Bond books and films ... who was also a superhero of sorts.

But Bond films also had the traditional narrative. Whether they still do is debatable.
 
To tiptoe lightly around Crispin Glover's propaganda comment, propaganda doesn't need to be overtly politically driven. In WWII this was certainly the case, as there was close cooperation between the government and entertainment industry around the war effort. Today, I think it's just the end result of studios realizing which types of films are most profitable, and those tend to be films that celebrate and reinforce the dominant values of the times. For me, that has always been the dividing line between mainstream "Hollywood" movies, and "Indie" movies. A Hollywood movie typically upholds current cultural values, an Indie movie challenges those beliefs. Hollywood movies are more comforting for people, and by and large, people want to be comforted when they sit down to passively watch a piece of entertainment which is why they are usually more profitable. This is one of the things that is so shocking about the reception of The Joker, as it is definitely more in the latter camp of thumbing its nose at cultural values and casting a critical eye at society. This can have value. Often times the only way people can see things for what they are is by taking a long, unflinching look in the mirror, and sometimes that reflection is not flattering.
 
Maybe it’s a generational thing but I’m with Scorsese and Coppola. Super hero movies are the result of studios finding the right formula to make tons of money by selling to both an American audience and a world audience - least common denominator junk. I never liked comics and I don’t like these awful movies. Did you see Mark Ruffallo in You can Count on Me? Do we really need Mark Ruffalo as Hulk? It’s a waste. These movies are going to kill cinema by their perverse scale.

I do like the newer dramas on the streaming services but they are hours and hours long. The unit of expression is a film, running about an hour ten to two hours. We are abandoning 100 years of a beautiful art, yes art, cinema.
 
It seems the debate is largely over semantics to some extent. I would lump movies like “Transformers” into this as well. Shallow, spectacle driven pieces that are are primarily driven by profit and corporatism. The point doesn’t need to be that there is something wrong with the business model, but I think Scorsese and Coppola are saying they are disappointed this has reached critical mass.

I am with them. This is popcorn amusement park fun but it’s not “cinema” in the sense they are defining (Ie closer to “high art”). It plays at 24p, shows in theaters, and has actors and cameras and editing. People worked hard on them. But if this is what our culture now deems high art, I’m in need of a new culture.

These are two grandpas who are complaining about a younger, shallower movie generation and the slow death of something good and deep. Whatever semantics one wants to use, trying to deny the core idea they are communicating seems pointless.

In other news, Beethoven > Eminem. Oops, new thread required!
 
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