Scorsese on film school

Jim Brennan

Jim Brennan

VHS Member Old Skool
The debate about film school seems never-ending. In reading Peter Biskind's "Easy Riders, Raging Bulls", I came upon the following quote from Martin Scorsese. I have never been to film school myself, but he seems to underscore the difference between what you learn in film school and what you don't rather succintly.

Scorsese on making Mean Streets:

"In order to get the picture made I had to learn how to make a movie. I didn't learn how to make a movie in film school. What I learned in film school was to express yourself with pictures and sound. But learning to make a movie is totally different. That's the people with the production board, the schedule. That means you gotta get up at five in order to be there, you gotta feed the people."
 
Right. You learn the mechanics of making a movie by making it. But you learn how to make a watchable, good story by studying storytelling (whether at a good film school, or at the bookstore), but nobody's born knowing how to make a good film.
 
...well, Spielberg maybe...... but nobody else is born knowing how to make a good film.


:thumbsup:
 
Even so, Scorsese still struggles with crafting a good narrative and he's been doing it for a long time. He's a great technical storyteller, but Gangs of New York and the Aviator weren't strong scripts. Technically they were well executed, but story wise both films don't compare to Taxidriver, Casino, or Goodfellas.
 
Well yes, he went to NYU. But he made most of his contacts after moving to LA to edit Medicine Ball Caravan. That's where he met people like Sandy Weintraub, Brian DePalma, Paul Schrader, Steven Spielberg and Verna Bloom hanging out at Margot Kidder and Jennifer Salt's beach house on the weekends.
 
Film school helps i'm sure...but I think you need a natural talent from the start.

On the lot is a good example.... kenny the non-filmschool punk and the girl that did go to film school both suck at making movies. Scorsese went to film school...Peter Jackson did not....they are both hugely talented filmmakers. So it doesnt matter whether you go or not.
 
I think all that matters is that you have the passion to make films, and the discipline and work ethic to work until your talent catches up to your vision.

Scorsese did grow at NYU. I've seen his student films and you can see the seed of his later strengths. I think the films he did at filmschool did help him later on in LA. I think it's easy for people who haven't gone to school to have a chip on their shoulder, but really, you just need to seek out those people with more experience than you and surround yourself with people who have the talents you lack.

I do think that it helps to learn tried and true methods, and then adapt that to your own style. It just makes working with professionals a lot easier when everyone speaks the same film language and shorthand.
 
Not to turn this into a Film school vs. No Film school debate...because GOD knows there there has been SOOOO many of them on here....

For me, one thing I got out of film school that I wouldnt have learned on my own is the history of filmmaking. Why movies look the way they did when they did. Why Bazin, Truffaut and Jean Luc Goddard were more than just relevant....Why the femme fatale in Film Noirs always kicked the bucket. Why our (Hollywood) movies have the usual happy go lucky endings that many foreign film markets seem to successfully go without. Why the Italian Western Superhero (aka Clint Eastwood) approached his conflicts they way he did...how Italian politics played into the final outcome of their amoral heros versus the much more typical American heros like John Wayne, etc.

Thing is, I NEVER would have sought out this info on my own. Having said that, there are SOOOO many brilliant people on this site who would seek this info out on there own and have and do. So, it was great for me personally...it helped fill the gaps for me...I actually learned stuff....but to make films, you can't learn that by writing papers....you gotta do it....

Rick
PS Plus if you like the movie 400 Blows film school is great. Its a great movie but you will wind up watching that no less than 3 times. It seems every professor LOVES that flick.:)
 
The most valuable aspect of film school is not making contacts. I wager that its making mistakes. You can screw up everything and learn what you did wrong. The fact that your film doesn't make money is OK because it goes toward your degree & gets you a grade.

I actually didn't go to film school but worked on countless projects for my college friends. We filmed an interview of Robert Rodriguez when he received his William R. Hearst Award from UT. We asked him about his student films and he refused to release them on a DVD (with the exception of Bedhead). Rodriguez claims that there's copywrite issues with the music in his shorts but I think he'd be embarrassed to show them. It would certainly ruin the illusion of Rodriguez jumping into the scene with the quality of the film "El Mariachi."

http://www.mindwarpentertainment.com/tv_robertrodriguez.html

 
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Rodriguez never claimed to jump onto the scene with El Mariachi. Read his book, he says that if you want to learn the guitar you practice practice practice until your fingers bleed. And that's what he said he did with those short films, he made dozens and dozens, maybe hundreds, before he got to Bedhead and started winning awards at festivals around the country. And he made all those before ever attempting something like El Mariachi.

You gotta learn, practice, and train. The idea that someone can make a good movie the first time they try, is about as plausible as the idea that someone can play the piano well the first time they try. Maybe one out of a billion can do it, but for the other 999,999,999 of us, it means years of study and years of practice and years of trying and failing over and over, before we learn the craft and learn from our mistakes to the point where we can do it well. Film school can be a great place to do that, if it's a GOOD film school. If it's a lousy film school then it's pretty much not more than a waste of money and time.
 
Reading the book would confirm the fact that it was an illusion? You just agreed with me but clarified that its not Rodriguez's fault people try to become overnight sensations.

I agree. But Rodriguez is still a good example of people jumping to the wrong conclusions about filmmaking. I'm happy to hear that he clarified in the book.
 
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Barry_Green said:
The idea that someone can make a good movie the first time they try, is about as plausible as the idea that someone can play the piano well the first time they try. Maybe one out of a billion can do it
Click to expand...

hopefully this summer i will be the one.
 
Reading the book would confirm the fact that it was an illusion? You just agreed with me but clarified that its not Rodriguez's fault people try to become overnight sensations.
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Rodriguez sends mixed messages. In the book "Rebel Without A Crew" he makes it very clear that you have to work your fingers to the bone before you dare to set out to try to make a feature.

But then he goes on his DVDs with his "10 minute film school" and tells the audience "just go out and shoot, now you know everything you need to know."

Making a good film is nearly impossible; look at how many times Hollywood tries and misses. And that's with the best writers, directors, cast, crew, and budgets in the world. To tell impressionable newbies that all they have to do is grab a camera and shoot... it sends the wrong message.

As for "overnight sensations" -- I read somewhere that the average "overnight sensation" puts in 12 years of hard effort before they hit that big break and become that "overnight" sensation. Jordin Sparks may have just become an "overnight sensation" at the young age of 17, but look at her resume; she's been working awfully hard for a long, long, long time...

hopefully this summer i will be the one.
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Well, see, now ugafan's gone and claimed the one spot so the rest of us had just better get back to learning, practicing, studying, and schooling (whether at the hands of film school instructors, or in the pages of excellent books). :)
 
Barry_Green said:
Well, see, now ugafan's gone and claimed the one spot so the rest of us had just better get back to learning, practicing, studying, and schooling (whether at the hands of film school instructors, or in the pages of excellent books). :)
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don't worry, with a world population of more than 6 billion, that leaves room for about 5 more people.
 
Barry_Green said:
Rodriguez sends mixed messages. In the book "Rebel Without A Crew" he makes it very clear that you have to work your fingers to the bone before you dare to set out to try to make a feature.

But then he goes on his DVDs with his "10 minute film school" and tells the audience "just go out and shoot, now you know everything you need to know."
Click to expand...

Well, not's not necessarily wrong.

What maybe gets lost is the (unspoken? unemphasized?) rest of it. We all pretty much know how to do it, we just aren't very good at it right from the get-go.

So it's shoot shoot shoot, practice practice practice.

It'll come quickly for some, others will be slogging along for years before it all comes together.

Some give up too soon. And some don't give up soon enough and become bank tellers instead. :)
 
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