Dear Marvel Fans,
I hope you read this letter with the utmost respect, as I certainly don’t mean to insult your intelligence. I’ve noticed on Twitter, you’ve been yelling into the void again, and it’s been going on for a very long time. From what I gather, you got upset over the fact that Mr. Martin Scorsese described your favorite movies as not being in the category of cinema.
Things seemed to escalate from there when Mr. Francis Ford Coppola came out in defense of Mr. Scorsese and called your movies despicable. Other filmmakers followed such as a Mr. Ken Loach. I wonder if you know who Ken Loach is, he’s a British filmmaker who won the Palme D’Or (The top prize) at the Cannes film festival twice for his films The Wind that Shakes the Barley and I Daniel Blake.
I wonder if you know what the Cannes Film Festival is. It’s this Festival in France where they celebrate films around the world. Mr. Scorsese won the Palme D’Or at Cannes once for his film Taxi Driver and Mr. Coppola won one as well for his film Apocalypse Now. I’m curious if you’ve heard of any of these films, it’s okay if you haven’t.
Now your movies have been categorized by Mr. Scorsese as “not cinema”, and I don’t believe that should be something to be upset about. There are many good things in life that are also “not cinema”, such as dogs, cats, sporting events, farmers markets, or theme parks, which is something that Mr. Scorsese associates your movies with. That’s pretty good company to be a part of. In fact there are more things in life that are “not cinema” than things that are.
To give a distinct definition of what Mr. Scorsese might call as being “cinema”, a good place to start would be his documentary A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies. You can actually find it on YouTube, a place where many of you like to air your grievances. In the documentary, Scorsese goes through a personal history of his relationship with “Cinema”.
Some of the titles that he references in the documentary are The Bad and the Beautiful, Public Enemy, The Searchers, Duel in the Sun, Citizen Kane, Meet Me in St. Louis, The Tall T, Barry Lyndon, All that Heaven Allows, Bigger Than Life, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, 42nd Street, The Bandwagon, The Roaring Twenties, and The Naked Kiss. I’m curious if you have heard of any of these movies. I mean it’s alright if you haven’t, they’re not for anybody, but if you watch them, I would guess it might open up your mind as to what type of cinema Mr. Scorsese is talking about. They don’t include anyone dressed in costumes with some super powers, but they do include people who represent part of the human experience, and how they relate to the real world.
Now if you get through the entire four hour running time of A Personal Journey (Which is one hour longer than Avengers: Endgame), and you’re still not sure what Mr. Scorsese might be talking about when he references “cinema”, you might want to check out his other documentary called My Voyage to Italy.
In this film, Scorsese narrates his love of Italian cinema using works by the likes of Vittorio De Sica, Luchiano Visconti, Federico Fellini, and Michelangelo Antonioni. Do any of those names ring a bell? They’re Italian filmmakers, and most of their films are done in subtitles, which does require some reading but again that might not be your thing. However, what you might be missing out on is an education of Italian cinema which Scorsese felt compelled to share with those who are interested. It came not only from a love for these films, but to keep them alive in the public consciousness.
You see, a long long time ago, before Tony Stark put on his Iron Man suit, movie theatres used to show these films like the ones Mr. Scorsese references on a regular basis. It might have been harder to access the foreign films unless you were close to an arthouse movie theatre, but the rest could be seen at local cinemas. But soon something happened which would marginalize these films from theatres very dramatically. There was an influx of big event movies, known as blockbusters.
This is usually pinpointed around the time of 1975, when a film named Jaws premiered. Do you know Jaws? Some of you may know it, it was about a giant shark terrorizing a community. A lot of people saw it, and it ushered in this wave of big budgeted movies catered to attract a large audience.
Suddenly the films that Mr. Scorsese was talking about in his documentaries were fading out of fashion fast, and we were subject to what would be considered the franchise film. These would include the type of themes parks or rollercoaster rides that Mr. Scorsese references in his comments, and they were largely accepted by the public as to what cinema is.
But a funny thing happened, you see this big corporation known as Disney, decided it was in their best interests to buy a lot of these “franchises” and hold a monopoly on them because they wanted to make a lot of money. No one really tried to stop them because everyone really loved these franchise rollercoaster rides and they made a lot of money for the head of this company named Mr. Bob Iger. Now most people are watching these theme parks, and being brought up by them, and they are convinced that they define cinema. Meanwhile, the other films Mr. Scorsese champions are being forgotten, and in some cases, in danger of being lost forever.
Now perhaps the comments Mr. Scorsese made about your movies stemmed from bitterness, or perhaps they came from a sense of desperation. But the cold hard truth is that what many people perceive to be cinema isn’t really what he is talking about, and what he’s really talking about are the films that are being erased from existence. He actually made a movie about this subject called Hugo, which was marketed as a family film, perhaps in the hopes its message could reach more people, except it failed to make a mark at the box office perhaps because it wasn’t significant IP.
But you, you who scream into the void, do you know about Hugo? Do you know the man you are screaming at? Do you know Mr. Scorsese beyond Goodfellas, or Casino? Do you know his first film Who’s that Knocking at My Door? Or even his first masterpiece Mean Streets? Do you know of his music films like The Last Waltz, No Direction Home, or Living in a Material World? Do you know his dark, urban comedies like King of Comedy, or After Hours?
Or his update to the woman’s picture with Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, or his deconstruction of the musical with New York, New York? Maybe you’re well versed with his costume period films like The Age of Innocence or Gangs of New York, or his brilliant religious trilogy The Last Temptation of Christ, Kundun, and Silence?
Do you know of his undying passion for film preservation, and introducing foreign cinema to North American audiences? Scorsese is the patron saint of cinema, which is an artform I question if you even like.
When you scream into the void, your arguments sometimes come off as ignorant, because you don’t sound like you know what you’re talking about. You reference Mr. Scorsese’s filmography with two or three of his films from the gangster genre, as if that’s all he’s done, however if you truly loved cinema, you would know there’s more to him than just that. So if you don’t love “cinema” what do you love?
Is it just the franchises you love? Is it just the reboots, remakes, and re-imaginings of the same films over and over again that make you salivate at night? If that is all it is, then you may not love cinema, you may just love these things you grew up on, that capture your childhood or innocence; theme park rides that work in a loop which you are now stuck in and can’t break out of because it fills a hole in your life that you’re missing.
Perhaps it’s a purpose, or empathy, or love you need but whatever it is, it makes you scream out into a void in order to make you feel important and not insignificant. However, Mr. Scorsese isn’t here to validate you, rather he’s here as a voice for film lovers, a voice that is needed, because it is fading away fast. You have won the culture war, yet you are still drawing battle lines. I suppose you resent the resisters, for there will always be those who don’t like theme parks, and if they don’t fall in line, it leaves a bitter taste in your mouth.
I hope you enjoy your Theme Park rides, I really do, and I hope Disney doesn’t control your life forever. I hope you branch out and discover what Mr. Scorsese considers “cinema”, and I hope you join the fight to keep these films alive, because if you truly love this artform, then you really should be speaking out against the bad guys who are trying to take it away from us.
Sincerely,
Jeremy (A lover of cinema)