Danai Gurira addresses the whole Marvel vs. Cinema thing
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever star Danai Gurira defends director Ryan Coogler from Martin Scorsese's Marvel commentary
Aux News Danai Gurira
When Martin Scorsese first drew blood with his commentary on superhero blockbusters not being true cinema, did he know every Marvel actor in its very large stable of stars would be forced to respond to those comments for the rest of time? Perhaps it was all a part of his diabolical plan. In a world where Marvel is, for better or worse, winning the war, at least Team Cinema is winning this battle (annoying the hell out of MCU actors).
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever star Danai Gurira is the latest to weigh in, and needless to say she’s offended on behalf of her corner of the MCU. “Well, I’ve worked very closely with Ryan Coogler. My experience working under his helm, it’s definitely deeply cinematic in every way I can imagine,” she tells GQ when asked about the opinions of Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola.
“We’re not leaving anything at home. We’re bringing it all. We’re bringing our understanding of our culture, understanding of our humanity, of our gender, of the complexities therein of this world that we’re in, and all the specificities of this world,” the playwright and actor says. “We have to come in and pour all we’ve got into this franchise. And that’s what we definitely, definitely do. We didn’t get through either movie and be like, ‘Oh, that was nothing.’ No. It was all we had. It was all we had, and then some. So I hope that’s cinema to somebody.”
Black Panther is an interesting wrinkle in this ongoing debate, given its historic nature and unique cultural impact. It is inescapably Marvel in a way that Sorcsese would most certainly disapprove, yet the hero’s solo outing surely has more depth to offer than its team follow-up: the CGI-heavy, plot-light Avengers: Infinity War. (Anthony Russo, who directed Gurira in her extremely minor roles in Infinity War and Endgame, is quoted in the GQ profile as saying “There aren’t a lot of actors who can pull off that combination of an inner depth with a really remarkable physical presence and capacity.”)
Fans can weigh in as to whether the Wakanda-based films are cinema to them. In the meantime, chalk this one up as another entry in a long-running saga that gives the MCU a run for its money.
211 Comments
Honestly, it didn’t seem like Scorsese even saw the movies he’s criticizing, so this is a case of people responding to an old man yelling at what he thinks the clouds look like.Hummm….‘people responding to an old man yelling at what he thinks the clouds look like’-The A.V. Club
“Honestly, it didn’t seem like Scorsese even saw the movies he’s criticizing”
Well, you’ve proven that you didn’t even bother reading what he actually wrote. That’s a win for…….someone?
I can assume he’s probably seen at least one or two. I don’t know what it is with Marvel, if you don’t like the films (as I don’t either), some fan will insist that you just haven’t seen enough of them yet.
The stuff he said about nothing in the comic book movies growing or changing(paraphrasing) made it pretty clear that he’s talking out his ass, in my opinion.
I mean Peter Parker’s changed his look three times! So eat it, Marty.(Note: Spiderman 2 is my favorite superhero movie all time.)
Condorman is better.
It did have Barbara Carerra.
Correct. Spider-Man 2 wine by any proper measure. The train fight is one for the ages; so is the tentaclectomy massacre; nobody has donea better tragic villain than Molina; so few films bother with a decent hero/villain relationship (Peter’s dinner with Dr and Mrs Octopus is so structurally excellent)
How many times has Uncle what’s his name died?
Your opinion is stupid considering you are an idiot who likes Marvel movies and thinks he knows more about cinema than Martin Scorsese. Maybe consider shutting the fuck up and learning from your betters instead of opening your mouth and blathering.
I’m assuming this is sarcasm and giving you a star because it made me laugh.
Who ungreyed this clown?
Is this a real comment, or a piss-poor attempt at satire?
::reads posts::Why are you this way?
Your opinion is stupid considering you are an idiotFinally, some intelligent discourse.
thinks he knows more about cinema than Martin Scorsese I’m sure Marty knows more about movies IN GENERAL than almost anyone else alive. But we’re not speaking in general here. Signs indicate that Scorsese hasn’t seen the Marvel films he complains about, and if that’s the case anyone who has
seen them knows more about those particular films than him.And ultimately Scorsese’s complaining about Marvel comes off as silly because Marvel isn’t taking anything away from him. They’ve got their niche and he’s got his. He got to make a nearly four hour motion picture – something the big studios of the past never let him do – during the peak of Marvel’s popularity. The Irishman was fantastic, and it got a Best Picture nomination. Clearly Marty and his “cinema” are doing just fine in the age of movie superheroes.
lol this has to be a troll comment. You don’t really take yourself this seriously do you?
sure
There is something in that though – because of how they build into a series, the whole really is greater than the sum of its parts.Of course, if you watched a few episodes of a show and didn’t care for it, I’m not gonna tell you to stick out a whole season 😛
Trust me, no matter how many of those films I’ve seen and not particularly enjoyed, I’ve been told I need to watch more and then I’ll surely like them. It feels like I’m being recruited for a cult.
Yeah, some people really project their own tastes and sensibilities, and if you don’t like something popular they’ll just think you’re being some kinda contrarian (or a recovering alcoholic, if it’s booze).
I believe that’s known as the Zappa defence.
He probably stopped after Howard the Duck and Fantastic Four.
I believe he said that he hadn’t at the time, but I could be wrong.
It’s like someone saying that they heard “Twist and Shout” and “Love Me Do” so they know they don’t like the Beatles. Maybe. But there’s a lot of variety in there beyond the early stuff and things keep evolving. And both involve racoons with similar names.
Except that the Beatles’s style of music continuously evolved over the course of only a few years. The MCU, not so much.
It’s madness how folks really seem to think that those movies aren’t all ridiculously similar. Every single one is about someone with magical powers learning to deal with those magical powers
All of Picasso’s stuff looks the same to me. Besides, I cried when Groot died, but nobody’s ever cried at Guernica. QED.
I’ve never gotten a stiffie from “Les Demoiselles”, and I certainly can’t say that about internet porn, so there we are.
Different colored magic powers, you heathen!
With great power comes great….uh…what was it again? Cookie sandwiches? Oh, right, hey. Gimmie one of those!
Except not.For example, Black Panther was not about that. It was about someone with magical powers, who is quite comfortable with his magical powers, learning how to deal with the much bigger responsibility of leadership and the legacy of his forebears.Or the Iron Man movies where nobody has magic powers but for the most part they are about learning to deal with the consequences of your own actions and how to responsibly manage wealth and privilege.
And the villain is usually someone who’s got good intentions but Goes Too Far (which is the neoliberal critique of literally anyone who tries to change things too quickly for their liking), and there’s usually some mid-film inversion of what you thought things were like but really it’s this other thing.
Nahhhh I’d say one maybe two are all you need to see to know whether or not you like Marvel. One of those might need to be the first Avengers film. If someone can sit threw Iron Man, The Avengers, and maybe throw Ragnarok in there, and not fall in love then I’d say stop.
I’ve noticed a demographic of people who continually suffer threw Marvel films because they feel a certain FOMO. They’re frustrated that they don’t ‘get it’ yet but they don’t realize it’s just not for them.
Funnier still is the group of people who hate watch stuff like She-Hulk. People who adore some MCU entries but aren’t the audience for She-Hulk sitting threw it being angry it isn’t something else.
Whoa, you got special attention from our most toxic of trolls. That must mean that you’re on the right track!
How the fuck did that idiot ever get out of the greys?This is why Kinja needs a “block” function, to keep the 12 year olds from shitting all over the threads.
HAH! The lil’ shitbird below tried to dismiss me, so pardon me…::reads shitbird’s posts::Why are you this way?
Oh hey, I got dismissed too. High-five!
He’s a weird lil’ shitbird, ain’t he?
Oh man it’s Charlie Meadows, using an alt. That’s just delightfully fucking pathetic.
The problem isn’t the genre or subject matter, it’s the high level of corporate control over the end product. However much passion Ryan Coogler brings he doesn’t have final say over how the film looks or feels and there are certain plot elements that are always gonna feel like a corporate mandate (the friendly CIA agent for one.)
Sure, that’s what you’re saying, but it’s not what he said.And, quite frankly, taking crazy ass stories from(or like) the comics of my childhood, sanding off the rough edges and putting them on the big screen is pretty awesome. If you would have told me back in 1994 that Disney would make a whole series of Marvel movies leading up to about 6 hours worth of Avengers doing Infinity Gauntlet, I would have said you were crazy because nobody likes nerd shit but us nerds.Disney literally spent hundreds of millions of dollars to make a movie where a Celestial almost hatches from Earth, which is really its egg. Hundreds of millions on a movie about Dr. Strange and America Chavez dimension hopping. Huge concept shit like that is catnip for me, having the general public enjoy the hell out of it isn’t a bad thing in my opinion.Not having real centralized control of a storyline gets you shit like the Clone Saga and a large amount of the shit that went on in the X-Books after Claremont left. I’ll take a bit of homogenization if it means we get Kang on the big screen and Man-Thing on TV, thanks!
Or, for a movie comparison, not having centralized control of a storyline gets you shit like the Star Wars sequels.
Seriously! I was thinking in comic book terms but the new Star Wars movies are a great example of why some amount of homogenization is necessary.
Most of Star Wars is certainly not arty. Empire, maybe, but the rest are full of holes and all sorts of issues.
What? Coogler, and other Marvel directors, very much have control over how a movie looks and feels. He also chose to have Ross in the movie, because he’s a major character from first the run of the Black Panther comics written by a Black person, Priest, which the movie takes a bunch of inspiration from. Coogler talks about this in the director commentary, and elucidates the intentional use of color in scenes. White outsiders like Ross and Klaue are shot in drab, metallic blue tones while Wakandans are shot with warm hues and a lot of red, green an yellow. As the movie progresses, as Ross starts to disavow his mission and earn Wakanda’s trust, his attire starts picking up hints of vibrant color, and he’s shot in warmer tones. At the end, when Ross is watching T’Challa give his speech to the UN revealing Wakanda to the world, he, and all the UN are officials are wearing big UN badges that are blue, which Coogler wanted to signify as the UN being outsiders and Ross still having to straddle that world. But, yeah sure, Coogler had no control over the look or feel of his film. It’s also odd that you would think Disney corporate would somehow mandate that the CIA look good. Ross turns on the CIA, and just about every government agency in the MCU is portrayed as, in the least morally questionable, but more often outright corrupt and murderous.
Sans the Air Force in Captain Marvel. Otherwise, every previous institution has been infiltrated by the bad guys or is shit-assed incompetent.
I wasn’t even gonna get into that point but you’re entirely right: SHIELD has been run by HYDRA for years, Ross turns on the CIA, the Sokovia Accords, which were enacted based almost entirely on things that could have turned out WAY worse(Scarlett Witch’s blowing up the Wakandian embassy instead of letting the whole crowd get blown up) or fully Tony’s fault(like, everything else), were obviously wrong and got repealed.‘The military and government are good!’ is a Michael Bay movie message, not generally a Marvel one. Hell, Carol Danvers is a pilot but I didn’t get an overt ‘Rah Rah US Military!’ message from her film.
That “friendly CIA agent” is actually a big part of the Black Panther stories from the comics, so I’m not sure I’d count his presence as a Corporate Mandate. Here’s a fun quote from Christopher Priest, writer of the original stories that were adopted for the first film:I told them we needed a point of view character: someone who could validate the fears and presumptions of white superhero fans who’d surely be reluctant to buy a “black” book.I had sometime before created this character, an attaché (i.e. diplomatic flunky/babysitter) over Ka-Zar and had modeled him roughly after Michael J. Fox and Matthew Perry. I thought somebody like that might make a great point of view character for Panther.What does seem like a corporate mandate is that we didn’t meet him the same way we did in the comics, on the toilet, missing his pants, while referring to himself as the “Emperor of Useless White Boys”.Don’t worry, Mephisto stopped by and gave him pants shortly after this panel.
Honestly at this point it feels more like he yelled at a cloud once and now everyone keeps pointing and yelling “hey, it’s the cloud guy!” and entire websites sustain themselves off “cloud discourse.”
Partially, though I think he commented on it more than once.
Well, given that his Marvel criticism came out before this film, I’d say you’re kind of right?
He explained it in further detail. While his definition may be more internalized, I don’t 100% disagree with him.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/04/opinion/martin-scorsese-marvel.html
I can’t read the article because paywall but his basic premise in and of itself is flawed: Marvel movies are 100% cinema. HE might not think they are, but in objective reality the definition of ‘cinema’ absolutely includes Marvel movies.
Furthermore, his defining of Marvel movies as ‘not art’ is a huge insult to all the actual artists who work on those films. They are absolutely chock full of art made by dozens of artists. It might not be the kind of art that he understands or appreciates, but it’s art nonetheless.
Sorry, I know NYT can be finicky sometimes, I was able to read it for one moment and now I can’t.
He does address a lot of the points that you raise, but his main concern is that a lot of modern films don’t take on any risks, he really, REALLY doesn’t like the mass marketing approach to film that Disney champions.
It’s interesting that you bring up the art of dozens of artists, because his harshest criticism is that the films seem to lack the vision of an individual artist, which I would argue isn’t true for some of these works.
Again, I don’t 100% disagree with him.
That’s certainly fair but, on the other hand, I don’t think modern mass market films not taking risks has been a new thing since sometime in the ‘80s, if ever.
I’d say that complaint has the same meaning as complaints that modern music is all the same: It’s true if you restrict yourself to looking at the most popular forms of the medium, but holds up to less scrutiny when you actually get down to the nitty gritty. Some of the best music ever is being made now but the FM radio isn’t gonna play it for you. Some of the best cinema ever is, I’m sure, being made now, but you’re not gonna see it in your local AMC.
Not to mention that stuff that’s made for mass consumption ends up becoming art in time. Stories about Greek and Roman gods caused people to make statues for everyone to see, now they’re in museums as art. The Beatles synthesized a bunch of already existing sounds into music for teenagers who now look upon it as art. Shakespeare synthesized already existing tales to make plays for common people that are now considered art.
So, calling them ‘not art’ is not just technically wrong but probably extremely short sighted in an historical sense.
Jesus Christ, my man. Do you think that he’s unaware of the history of commercial art?It was the mole hillest of mole hill talking points that nerd culture stans and Future Disney Employees have turned into fucking Mega-Everest. Get the fuck OVER it, people.
“Get the fuck OVER it, people.”We’re having a pretty friendly, somewhat academic discussion here. There’s really no need to be angry about it, calm the hell down.
I think that it does have a “kids these days” vibe to it. I think, had he simply said that he doesn’t like the studio oversight of super hero movies, or something more to that effect, we’d all be agreeing with him.
Yeah – and I think good evidence of its level of artistry is that literally no one else has been able to pull off the “cinematic universe” despite numerous attempts.
I think a lot of people lump the MCU in with its imitators, and that skews their view of what the “genre” is and can be.
Toho did it in the 1960s, Universal in the 30s-40s.
Like the VFX houses that they routinely overwork and underpay? That kind of insult?Also, FWIW if you’re taking an objective view of “cinema” then you must categorize the works of Tommy Wiseau, Neil Breen, David DeCoteau, Jon De Hart et al as cinema. Otherwise “cinema” is entirely subjective and everyone with an opinion on Marty’s statements can stfu about it.I mean… Hell, the man thinks mother! is genius but I still respect his opinion.
“Also, FWIW if you’re taking an objective view of “cinema” then you must categorize the works of Tommy Wiseau, Neil Breen, David DeCoteau, Jon De Hart et al as cinema.”Yes, and?
Nothing more necessary! But I suspect (no confirmation as yet) that Murray Chang is not quite as open-minded about the definition as his responses imply. That he, too, has a highly subjective opinion on what constitutes “cinema” and it mysteriously includes MCU movies but not, for instance, the latter work of Steven Segal.
“FWIW if you’re taking an objective view of “cinema” then you must
categorize the works of Tommy Wiseau, Neil Breen, David DeCoteau, Jon De
Hart et al as cinema”Fucking Manos, Hands of Fate is cinema…it might be bad cinema but it’s cinema.
Fair enough!
Through the lens of MST3K, Manos is hilarious cinema.
If it’s any consolation, Gurira isn’t contributing anything at all to the comparison either. “We worked really, really hard on this” isn’t any kind of relevant contribution to the (purported) topic either way.
Not trying to criticize her because she’s a very good actress and a skilled playwright but her onscreen resume is all superhero movies and a zombie show how much can she contribute to the discussion?
I bet Scorsese doesn’t watch porn and thinks it’s the work of the Devil or whatever, but porn makes billion$$$ in profits. Moviemaking is a business, first and foremost. Netflix didn’t fund The Irishman because it wanted a long arty movie no one would watch.
This whole discussion is so kind of irrelevant. You can’t really judge art/entertainment in the moment. I mean, every time a movie, tv show or play comes out there are immediately tons of reviews, so you literally can… But that doesn’t have any real impact on how that art will be remembered. We use the very name “Shakespeare” to mean high-art or intelligent and cultured master works. But that dude wasn’t writing plays for the scholarly elites. He was writing for the masses who showed up for the sex and violence and the silly made up words he was creating, and they threw old vegetables when they saw something they didn’t like. And now we’re like “there’ll never be another one like that.” Who is to say that Ant-man becoming giant man isn’t our rose by any other name for the modern era?
“(Anthony Russo, who directed Gurira in her extremely minor roles in Infinity War and Endgame, is quoted in the GQ profile as saying “There aren’t a lot of actors who can pull off that combination of an inner depth with a really remarkable physical presence and capacity.”)”
Yeah, obviously. That’s why you had her do a scene that showcased her combination of inner depth and remarkable physical presence, right?
I like superhero bullshit fine, but people sound delusional as hell when they defend these movies as meaningful art.
End of the day, the endless articles and pull quotes don’t help. It’s a matter of opinion and a fairly vague one at that.
To many filmmakers (including the vast number more politic than Scorsese) superhero films are not cinema in that they don’t demonstrate (generally) the sophistication of story and character those creators generally try to get at. While that alone describes many films, they also have the added baggage of being extraordinarily transparent with their commercial considerations. Superhero films (again, generally) are fairly obviously products with hard edges sanded off so as to be palatable to a mass market. It makes sense that those in the industry who consider themselves artists wouldn’t like it in the same way that fine artists don’t care for Jeff Koons. But to people like myself, while recognizing these concerns (which also go for many non-superhero franchise films), I also see occasionally great movies coming out of the genre. The Dark Knight, The Incredibles, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Iron Man are all legitimately excellent films. I can’t defend the Disney Industrial Complex (especially since of late, their quality is very poor), but I’m also still excited about elements of these movies.
TL;DR: It’s a complicated issue, no one is going to have an answer, and articles like this are just adding noise without adding clarity. Neither side, when removed from the internet echo chamber, is saying anything all that radical. We’d be better off just ignoring it and liking what we like.
Why can’t anyone involved at marvel take any criticism at all? These movies are fine, but they aren’t exactly high art.
High/low art is a false dichotomy, though. There’s no good definition of “art” or “cinema” in the first place; nor any real correlation between thematic depth and commercial goals.This isn’t about “criticising” the films, it’s about how we talk about art altogether.
Agreed. It’s much more useful and instructive to look at each work and assess what messages it might send, how it uses the form, and what impact it has on society. All this “MCU movies vs ‘real’ art” nonsense is just tribalism in disguise. No, my tribe is better than your tribe!
Yeah, and you can’t really pigeon-hole most stuff into “high” or “low” categories anyway.Fury Road is a blockbuster franchise film, but has plenty to say. Michaelangelo’s paintings were payday works to fund his sculpting. A dick drawn on a toilet wall isn’t commercial, but it’s not prestigious either. And so forth 😛
Hey, the dick I drew on the stall wall in the Country Pride Market off state road 195 is very prestigious! It has a monocle and everything.
Of course it has a monocle, it only has one eye.
I’m sure it is, Honey. Now can you show us the works you have made that show you understand the rules you are breaking?
This is some username-comment synergy right here.
I put in the effort.
Would you ask Banksy that question?!
One of these days, my dicks are going to be sold at auction for millions of dollars, and then who’ll be laughing?
Yup. And they would have an answer that fulfilled the requirement.
And laughing at the expectation of a dick and being let down is not the win you think it is, Kiddo.
I find it disconcerting that you might not be catching on to the fact that I’m joking, but I find it more disconcerting that I might not be catching on to the fact that you are joking.
The mountain wins again.
Or The Devil needs no advocates.
It is reminiscent of all the derision from the ‘’music community’’ about rock music in the 1950s and 1960s. But the esteemed musician, composer, and conductor Leonard Bernstein once did a TV show where he talked about The Beatles and other acts are REAL music.
I think it’s important to note that most of these actors and directors aren’t just spontaneously saying this. They’re being asked questions during press junkets and at premiers and shit when they’re actively promoting their latest project.I’d also suggest plenty of them take criticism fine (I remember Stellan Skarsgard had some good things to say about the state of the film industry), but those answers tend to get less attention because they don’t generate enough traffic.
These movies are fine, but they aren’t exactly high art. Yep. 100%.
Lichtenstein stole their panels directly, so real art is stealing from the masses?
I don’t think Scorsese or any other MARVEL critics are saying that the cast and crew don’t bring their everything into these productions, but every single one of them (and I’ve seen them all up until the Multiverse of Madness) ends with a CGI firework show and a teaser for the next cog in a machine that is completely taking over cinema and restricting the other kinds of movies that can justify a theatre release. Thank God for streaming, otherwise I really don’t think we’d see many more character driven dramas or smart, small scale indie films. It’s the homogenisation of the kind of films we get to watch at the theatre and the business angle from which all these films are pitched and made that leads people to think they’re not “cinema”. The MCU does what it does incredibly well, but I can totally why people like Scorsese hate what it does, regardless of how much effort the people involved put in.
I went and saw Everything Everywhere All at Once (the *other* multiverse film of 2022) the day after I saw Doctor Strange 2: The Multiverse of Madness. The difference is like night and day.There’s a reason I’ve seen EEAAO three times (so far) and the other … not so much.
Fucking hell everyone, Scorsese yelled at that cloud almost two years ago now. Maybe we should just accept that he’s not a Marvel fan and move on with our lives?
The reason she is talking about it now is that she knows Martin Scorsese is right and the movie she is in is a joke.
This guy here. He secretly loves Marvel movies and is conflicted because his “hero” Marty thinks they’re drivel. It’s ok Metal, you can love something your imaginary mentor Marty hates. You remind me of the dudes that hate gay men because they secretly love the D. Come out bro, you’ll be happier for it.
What’s your favorite movie?
Nobody cares if he’s a fan or not, it’s the gatekeeping as to what constitutes “cinema” that chafes people.
How is it gatekeeping? Scorsese doesn’t own a studio or a distributor and he’s complaining about the most powerful entity in entertainment.
In that, thanks to his achievements in the medium, his words carry a lot of weight with a lot of people, to the point we’re still talking about this.
I think they might mean sort of “intellectual gatekeeping?” People like Scorsese’s work and value what he has to say, and so might be dismissive of this entire genre because they are encouraged to think that serious film buffs shouldn’t like Marvel movies? Something like that. But said in a smarter way.
FUCKING RIGHT?!?!?!I’d take the side of the guy who gives a shit about art, even if his outlook is outdated and biased, over a corporation that happens to make entertainment ANY DAY.
It only bothers idiots like you because you know he is 100% right about Marvel movies. Grow up and stop watching shitty Disney movies you idiot.
Sure it is.
It does kind of boil down to “stop liking what I don’t like”, doesn’t it?
Not at all. Not even a little bit. He has never said anything to that effect. He has never told audiences how to spend their money. It’s his considered opinion. And even if I disagree with him, it’s just ridiculous and dishonest the way it has been framed by nerds with grudges and people who need the employment Disney provides.
Nah, the problem with Marvel movies is the Fantasy Problem. You may care about the characters, but they don’t exist in the universe where a divorce, abortion, or inescapable neighborhood can center the movie. Tony Stark gets thrown eight blocks into a skyscraper and lives. The villains will never exist in the real world. Entire settings are fabricated. It’s like game of thrones: if it were a real person being raped up and down, we might not have the stomach to watch. Scorcese’s point is that escapism is rarely relatable. I might see anguish in Hulk’s face, but I’m not going to begin talking to an alienated uncle because of it. I for one see Marvel as a drug. It’s shiny but eventually I need to come back to Earth. Movies that dive deeper into the genuine human experience are simply more valuable.
If that’s a problem I’ve got horrible news about the discourse spanning the entire history of motion picture, theatre and literature.
Problems don’t have to be new to be problems.As an aside, I’ve always loved your screenname 🙂
To me it’s not as much a problem as it is a debate in taste. When I was in college we spent weeks debating what was “LITERATURE.” Some things were always considered literature. Some things were for a while and then demoted. Others weren’t, but were then elevated. It was all subjective and based on the tastes of the time, but the one unifying thread in my mind was that enough of the people who decide these things thought it was important.That’s all vague, and debatable though. Martin Scorsese says it isn’t to him, and that’s valid. I can see an argument where we should demand more than sky beams and CGI to challenge us. But on the other hand, who is to say how many black kids will be inspired to create art because they were swept up by Black Panther when they were 8 years old. It’s ultimately a question that refuses to be answered definitively. It’s a high minded way of asking whether a hotdog is a sandwich (Don’t answer that. I don’t caaaaaaare).Personally, I don’t think the MCU is very important, though at times they do things very well. I think the across the board character development in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 is outstanding. But was it important to me. I don’t know. As a whole, it doesn’t clear my threshold, but I’ll listen to arguments. To a point.
Fair enough, but on the flipside, literally no one is prevented from seeing or enjoying a Marvel movie by Martin Scorsese believing they’re not “proper” cinema. The MCU is the all-encompassing juggernaut dominating modern popular culture right now. To the extent that Scorsese is trying to gate-keep anything, he has utterly failed, as the MCU has completely smashed through the gates and taken over the whole castle.So yeah, I maintain that people can get over it.
This doesn’t end until he’s marched through the streets in front of the entire elite MCU fandom like Cersei Lannister and then ceremoniously stripped of his Academy Award for his bloated and hamfisted inferior remake of Infernal Affairs.
If I could also throw stones at him for the deeply UNscary and predictable POS Shutter Island, I’d be grateful.
*checks notes*I’ll allow it.
I do find some amusement in the fact that Scorsese and many others of the Film Brats made their names making pulp crime films and genre stuff that was at times dismissed by older generations as not art and now they are very quick to say what is or isn’t art.
I for one wanted to see Tony Stark do a pile of cocaine off of Christine Everheart’s ass. Damn you Jon Favreau, you swing dancing, gutless, feckless putz.
I’m not exactly sure who was dismissing their work as art, many of Scorsese’s movies and the actors and crew that worked them have been nominated for and received awards for their craft.
Also, if an example for this argument is say, “Taxi Driver” versus, I dunno, “Thor 2″?…
Or how about King of Comedy vs Joker? (Which is kinda… you know…)
I’m talking about the older generation of filmmakers when Scorsese first started. Look at the films from 1969 and how confused the old guard was about movies like Bonnie and Clyde, and you see that they were pretty clearly looked down on.I think it’s dismissive to say there is no artistry to superhero movies, just like prestige movies aren’t artistic just because they’re tropey. Both sides have their issues. Both sides have their artists.
Shang-Chi is no Mean Streets
No, but there were plenty of people who thought Mean Streets was a grim, dark mess that had too many screeching cars at the time.
This is a much better counter argument than the huffy bullshit you tend to get from fanbois.
FWIW Mean Streets got rave reviews when it first appeared, and Taxi Driver was nominated for four Academy Awards.
I’m talking about the older generation of filmmakers, not just critics, but the idea that Mean Streets got raves is an overstatement – Roger Ebert even discusses how it was both loved (largely by younger critics) and hated. Easy Riders Raging Bulls and Pictures at a Revolution both do an excellent job at analyzing the rivalry between the old guard and the new. Again, I’m not saying that neither movie is excellent. They’re masterpieces. But for a bunch of filmmakers who very much reconfigured what art is, it just seems odd to want to be the art police.
I dunno what Ebert says, and admittedly he was there, but everything I’ve read — including Biskind (p. 250 of my copy — yes, I did go and check, I’m that stubborn :D) — suggests that Mean Streets was overall very well received by critics even at the time. I mean, I’m sure it wasn’t unanimous, and there were probably a few lingering old farts who who didn’t get it and were moaning about it. But New Hollywood was well underway by 1973, and it seems at least a bit simplistic to suggest that Mean Streets was slated at the time then critically reappraised and so he’s being hypocritical to call out Marvel now. The evidence such as I’ve seen would seem to suggest that Scorsese’s attempts at artistry, even within typically ‘pulp’ genres, have by and large always been recognised and appreciated. In any case, even we do accept that as the case, it still comes back down to this: ain’t no one in the MCU doing anything remotely like Mean Streets. I mean, don’t get me wrong, they’re not bad, people have a right to enjoy them, and for all the pissing and moaning I’m pretty sure even Scorsese would acknowledge that. But I think it’s also fair to say that they aren’t exactly ‘reconfiguring art’ in the same way that Mean Streets did either.
I’m also not suggesting anyone is making the MCU version of Mean Streets. My point was that a lot of the people who are he loudest voices about what superhero movies are or aren’t are people who also faced similar criticism early in their careers.
But Scorsese doesn’t appear to have ‘faced similar criticism’ in his early career. Even leaving aside the fact that all evidence suggests that even his early films were still widely (if not unanimously) praised by critics, the big criticisms of the MCU are its (over-)reliance on formula and pastiche and it’s general lack of artistic ambition; that it’s overall quite content to just make entertaining but generally middling blockbusters which often feel quite samey despite some mild (and often somewhat superficial) differences in style. Say what you will about Scorsese, those are criticisms that were never applied to his earlier work; he was never seen as a filmmaker who was just playing it safe and sticking to convention. Even the criticism he received at the time for films like Mean Streets was because he was going against the accepted ways of doing things; when’s the last time a Marvel film has been criticised because it was too ambitious, different and radical for the film establishment to handle?Scorsese’s work may have received criticisms for many things at the time, but even his critics never accused Mean Streets of just being a hollow theme park ride.
Three years ago.
Guys, just accept that he watches movies and “absorbs” content in a different way. He’s most likely just very bored by Marvel films and doesn’t find them entertaining.
This is all heading towards a battle in the Thunderdome, isn’t it?You know, because of all the wheel spinning.
*snerk*
Can’t we just get beyond Thunderdome?
“Your mark *could* speak of Thunderdome in a positive manner but if I were you I would wait until someone SLAMMED a Thunderdome.”I see you, fellow MSTie.
A great scene in Goodfellas, Henry walking across the street about to bust the face of Karen’s neighbor who assaulted her.A great scene in Endgame, Cap ready to take on all of Thanos’ army when Sam says “On your left”
Sounds like all these Marvel people keep sharing their opinions on this because the interviewers keep fucking asking them.
They are obsessed with Scorsese’s opinion because they know he is a real artist and filmmaker and that Marvel is shit watched by idiots.
You are not special just because you sit on your ass watching crime movies while other people sit on their asses watching superhero movies.
Or maybe it’s possible to recognize quality in more than one thing? Or maybe have enjoyment in something that isn’t the height of artistic snobbery?A greasy burger can be just as enjoyable as Kobe beef.
Marvel is inedible burger made of shit. That’s why the idiots are so mad at Scorsese for pointing that out.
Or maybe it’s possible to recognize quality in more than one thing? Yes. You recognize this fact, because you’re not an idiot.Signed,~Someone Who Skips Most Marvel Movies
I’m so tired of how the media makes this sound like an organically ongoing conflict when the fact is they ask everyone in the film industry so they can generate more outrage clicks.And what’s an actor promoting a movie they just finished going to say? On the one hand they’re literally under contract marketing the film, and on the other presumably many of them still worked hard on them and aren’t about to turn around and blow off the entire experience out of hand either. It’s not like they’re ever going to turn around and say that yeah, they spent the last however many months of their lives acting as a glorified Mickey Mouse costume character.This must be the stupidist, most manufactured conflict ever.
Pardon me, the shitbird below likes to dismiss replies: They are obsessed with Scorsese’s opinion because they know he is a real artist and filmmaker and that Marvel is shit watched by idiots. Why are you this way?
probably to balance the pro marvel bent in these threads
Because after Gamergate, internet pissbaby is now a career path.
Yeah I was hoping to leave them in the greys. Oh well.
Nothing shows insecurity like replying to a quote for three years
The rise of nerd culture has been fucking awful. It makes me regret my own nerditry. It’s not enough to have basically all of entertainment catering to them, they DEMAND to be Taken Seriously!
Eh, it’s most of the country at this point. “You WILL validate me, you legion of online strangers!”
There’s a difference between seeking personal validation and demanding validation of one’s interests. I understand “Please take me seriously as a human.” That’s one thing. But nerd culture says “Take the artifacts of our tribe seriously.” Which is less reasonable. Even *less* reasonable is “Take the mass produced corporate-owned artifacts sold to our tribe seriously.”
Yes, of course, we must always ask everyone what they think of this pointless controversy, and we must dutifully report on every last response. This is not a waste of anyone’s time.
This guy gets it!
I remember, when I was young, I used to be really dismissive of rom-coms. In my eyes they were all dull, formulaic fluff, good only for mindless entertainment.A few years ago I read, on this very website, Caroline Siede’s excellent “When Romance met Comedy” series, in which week after week she found interesting and insightful things to say about a genre I’d expected nothing from. I realised I can’t really discern the good from the bad in that genre, not because it’s genuinely homogenous, but because I don’t have the palette for it.Whenever I see someone weighing in that action movies or superhero movies aren’t properly “art” or “cinema”, I just see teenage me deriding rom-coms.
Fantastic series – actually, was the the last great AVC series, or have I missed something since?
The Egg Salad War?
I really enjoyed “Together, Together” with Ed Helms and Patti Harrison. Pretty sure I heard about it from “When Romance met Comedy”.
I would like to also stump for it’s sort of companion-y series, “A History of Violence” by Tom Breihan, which was about action movies. Both were absolutely fantastic, revelatory work written by fans of the genre, well researched but accessible…this comment actually makes me think it would have been amazing to have Tom and Katie then watch each others’ top five or something and comment on their experience with the other’s genre.
There was a superhero one as well, though the name eludes me rn.I miss the days when we had interesting conversations about films here, rather than about what other people say about them.
That was an amazing series of articles and really made me reevaluate my dismissive approach to the genre. It’s still not my cup of tea, but I definitely appreciate it a lot more thanks to her.
That series was so good. Its a shame she never got to cover all of Audrey Hepburns rom coms. Her writing on Breakfast at Tiffanys is one of my favorite pieces ever done on the AV Club. Comparable to the Contract To Kill review.
That’s not really what Scorsese was saying though. It had much more to do with the way superhero films have taken over the marketplace and become corporate products that have to tie into eachother and set up Disney+ series at every turn. There’s no real comparison to romcoms or really anything because it’s unprecedented.
That’s the thing though, there’s two conversations here that are being conflated. One is whether franchise movies are *proper* cinema, to be considered anything other than “theme park rides” (and to hear some of the commenters here, you’d think Disney invented commercial art); and the other is the juggernaut success and ubiquity of not only Marvel’s franchise, but its imitators, at the expense of smaller studios/works.What’s happened though is that THE DISCOURSE has coupled these conversations, turning it into a bullshit argument over whether “lesser” films have taken over the landscape and pushed “real” cinema out.
I agree, but I’m just saying I don’t think Scorsese intended his essay to be boiled down to that one phrase that people keep responding to. Whether you agree or not, his point was more nuanced and less pretentious than it might sound.
that must be comforting!
oof this post made me nostalgic for old-AV Club
I watch both. One day it could be End Game or Black Panther, another day it could be Roshumon or The Great Beauty. Music works this way as well, obviously. As long as it’s good, well done…hell or just funny and entertaining (NOT BORING LIKE THE IRISHMAN FFS) It’s time well spent.
This seems to be the movie version of the Literary Fiction Serious Novel by an MFA vs “genre” fiction debate. That is to say, more about respectability than actual quality. You can have laughably bad oscar-bait “cinema” and really great examples of popular/escapist genre films. The problem is when “cinema” or “literary fiction” is used as shorthand for “superior in every way to that trash over there.” But I’m sure the AV Club, defender of nuanced and thoughtful conversation about pop culture and not at all promoter of click-bait, knows that full well.
Look, you may not like false dichotomies, but the alternative is cannibalism.
I don’t think Sorcsese is wrong, but he also isn’t right. At the end of the day your comparing apples to oranges. Are Marvel movies the height of film making as an art form, no and they don’t pretend to be. They aren’t thought experiments, they are fun (assuming you like superhero movies, popcorn flicks. They aren’t trying nor did they claim to be high art. It’s no different than action movies, they are here to entertain, nothing more nothing less. Can they be good, absolutely, but they are designed to entertain, and in the MCU’s case tall a longer overarching story, something the MCU does better than anyone else full stop, at least insofar as the Thanos saga. But I don’t think you have EVER had a crowd reaction to a Sorcsese like you did when Capitan America called Mjolnir to him, the crowd goes wild literally, or when Iron Man sacrificed himself.
But I don’t think you have EVER had a crowd reaction to a Sorcsese like
you did when Capitan America called Mjolnir to him, the crowd goes wild
literally, or when Iron Man sacrificed himself.Why is this automatically a good thing? Don’t get me wrong, I was cheering and weeping along with everyone else at those moments in Endgame, but the notion that being able to evoke a huge cheer moment is somehow automatically a good thing is… odd.
No one said “automatically”. But in this particular case, because it’s an indication that a large portion of the audience is really invested in these characters. Something that really exhibits the strength of this shared universe that allowed us to get to know the characters over time, in a way normally reserved for television.
Well it’s not the being able to evoke a huge cheer, but that outside of being entertaining, a movie should make the audience feel, something. Fear, joy, happiness, disgust, whatever, and a movie doesn’t have to be good from say a technical standpoint, but saying a Marvel movie can’t be true cinema is kind of stupid. It’s just not Scorcese’s type of cinema which is fine.
Sure, I get that. I think the most charitable way to view this whole “debate” is that some people think that the likes of the MCU aren’t particularly deep, introspective, or insightful; while the kinds of movies Scorsese favors, are (or at least are trying to be; there’s plenty of movies that think they’re deep but are pretentious or inept). And I wouldn’t say that that automatically makes them superior in any way, either; I don’t see a problem with some art being shallow and flashy and some art being deep and thoughtful.But one could easily argue that too much of our cultural conversation is dominated by the shallow and flashy. This unfortunately tends to get expressed with the notion that shallow and flashy is always bad or inferior to deep and thoughtful, which as you imply, is a nonsensical position.
Yeah it’s very much a case of different stroke for different folks. He is judging MCU films by his films which is dumb, that’s like judging an action flick by the standards of a romcom. Like I am a self professed horror slut, but I don’t find the recent surge of art house horror to really be horror movies at all IMO.
If anything, I think it’s the sort of thing that leans it away from cinema and toward roller coaster. But that then raises the question, why aren’t roller coasters art? I doubt Scorcese could design one, the hack.
Yeah, but if he did, it would be one long continuous ride with no breaks!
Can trash take on a higher form? Yes, if it knows the rules of art and subverts them intentionally.
John Waters needs to direct a Marvel Movie.
I was scrolling down and saw your first lines first, and immediately thought of John Waters (whom I’ve luckily met) and then I looked down further and there was your Waters line. Great minds, etc.
They are setting up Ironheart in this movie. That alone kind of proves Scorsese’s point, which is more nuanced than just the “this isn’t cinema” everyone pulls to be sensational.
NOTES FROM WEIRD SHITBIRDS WHO SHOULD BE IN THE GRAYS: They are obsessed with Scorsese’s opinion because they know he is a real artist and filmmaker and that Marvel is shit watched by idiots. Who hurt you, you sad, strange little man?
Seriously though — whoever let this child out of the greys needs to step forward, own up, and explain themselves. Any cursory glace through his posting history would preclude that decision.
Yep. Dude sucks.
It sounds like the same troll that’s been posting under another name in recent weeks.
They’re all Dom (a.k.a., EBuzzMiller).
I think it’s a combination of people replying to argue with them, people promoting them because “Marvel bad”, and maybe sock puppet alt accounts ungreying them.
All the cinema fans really should have supported “Amsterdam”.
More like Amsterdon’t—AMIRITE?
Amsterdontgiveadamn!
Or Amsterdamned!Oh, wait. That’s already a film and it had an awesome spreedboat chase in the canals!
One would almost think a bunch of movie review sites pooled their funds and slipped Scorsese a fat envelope with a request to issue a pronouncement that would be clickbait for the ages.
He’s not James Cameron being asked to talk about a Terminator sequel.
I like the Marvel movies but it’s still sweet delicious wine to me seeing all these actors get so heated because of one dude’s opinion. Like guys get over it, Marty doesn’t have a high opinion of your movies, you can still make them and clearly audiences still love them. You’re getting filthy rich from the oodles and oodles of money these things rake in, why so caught up on this one guy?
I don’t think that anyone needs to think all superhero movies are high art. I do think it’s dismissive to say that no superhero movies are capable of being art, and I do find it odd for those comments to come from the filmmakers who back in their day were the ones making movies that older filmmakers said weren’t art. It’s not good for film to say that genre work can’t be amazing work. It’s also not good for film to say all genre work is amazing.And the MCU has given some acting challenges to some actors. Oscar Isaac in Moon Knight was clearly getting to do a lot of actorly stuff that he wanted to do. Elisabeth Olsen in Wandavision got to showcase all sorts of sides to herself.
I remember seeing a comment here that while more prestigious films lean more on theme, the MCU leans more on characters – making the former “directors’ movies” and the latter “actors’ movies”. It’s an interesting thought, imo.
In the 30’s and 40’s, you know what movies were seen as
disposable, mass-produced trash for the masses? Gangster movies. Yet
Scorsese built a career from making crime and mob pictures which are
masterful works of art, and that has caused critics to look back on some
of the dismissed gangster films of the old days and reevaluate their
value. No genre of movie is automatically disqualified from being
“cinema.”
Especially since “cinema” is just a fancy
word for “movie” which film snobs have given a massive sense of
inflated importance to. Fuck that. All films are by definition cinema. And all categories of film have the potential to be great, even the most disrespected. If they didn’t, Scorsese would be a nobody.
You’re being awfully reductionist though, as though Scorsese can only make gangster pictures and nothing else. He built a career with Raging Bull, Last Temptation of Christ, King of Comedy and others, and has continued to make excellent movies that aren’t about crime/mobsters (Silence and Shutter Island, for example).
so to her it’s “cinema” because they worked really hard on it? I worked really hard on the turd I dropped this morning!
I mean I feel like it’s hard to truly argue the cinematic merit of your work when you are obligated, if not required, to watch 27 other movies in order to get the most from your movie. That’s not Cinema.
First, I think Martin fucking Scorsese is entitled to his opinion on the movie industry. It’s not like it’s Mc G or some other hack director. Second, I think it’s condescending for these interviewers to keep asking actors about it. “Hey so this famous director says your body of work isn’t important how do you feel?!” Third, I think the point Scorsese was trying to make was that superhero films are just a corporate product made for them to make money. It’s made strictly because it raises the bottom line for a company. Scorsese would make films because he was an artist creating art. Obviously he needs his movies to make money too or people won’t give him the time of day, but that wasn’t his driving force for making a movie. I certainly think some directors (Like coogler) are great at making films, and it certainly is art. But if it wasn’t something that made Disney money, it wouldn’t be considered.
Super powered people have nothing to teach audiences about the human condition, that’s for mass murdering gangsters to do.
This, but not sarcastic
Movies about gangsters are like films about Nazis for me. I just want them in jail or dead and couldn’t care less about their anxieties. But enjoy!
Scorsese clarified what he meant like three years ago.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/04/opinion/martin-scorsese-marvel.html
You’re assuming two things here:- That those disagreeing with Scorsese’s stance do so because they don’t understand it, rather than disagree with the underlying premise- That we can all access the same paywalled articles you can
We like what we like. We also don’t like what we don’t like.We’re not gonna like the same things, and that’s okay.This whole discourse is tiring.Martin Scorsese doesn’t like superhero movies?? Cool. Quentin Tarantino doesn’t wanna be a “hired hand” to direct a Marvel movie? Fine; whatever. I genuinely couldn’t care less; their criticism of the genre won’t change my enjoyment of the same.
This isn’t about liking or disliking movies, it’s about what gets to be considered “art”/“cinema”.
That’s fair.Art and cinema are subjective, and no one has any claim over the other.
See… I think this is part of the problem. “gets to be”. Where has Scorsese said that he’s the sole arbiter of classification? He doesn’t think the MCU is cinema but is he stopping anyone else from feeling or saying otherwise? I keep seeing people talk about his “gatekeeping” but what gate? How is he keeping it? The only people who care about Scorsese classifying MCU movies as “cinema” are defensive, self-conscious nerds who still STILL somehow see themselves as cultural pariahs. It is fucking LUDICROUS that these assholes aren’t satisfied to be making all the money and sucking up all the attention but for some reason desperately need people of standing in the film community to give them the respect they feel fucking OWED. Good. Lord. You have fucking WON, nerds. Let Martin goddam Scorsese have whatever outdated opinion he wants.
The problem isn’t that Scorsese has an opinion on superhero movies. It’s that there’s a certain subset of snobby film buffs who turn their noses up at these films and their fans, and Marty’s comments have pretty much validated their views. “See, I knew you’re a culture-less idiot for liking these, Scorsese said so!” Scorsese is a great director, a living encyclopedia of movies, and if anyone is entitled to have an opinion on film (and have you respect it), it’s him. Not so much for all those anonymous blowhards hacking away at their keyboards calling MCU fans ignorant morons or whatnot.No one likes being treated like an idiot for liking what they like. That’s where the problem is IMHO. That being said, journalists really need to stop bringing this up in every single interview. The whole “Let’s ask a director what he thinks of the MCU” bit is played out and only creates unnecessary drama.
Look, if you want to love kids movies as an adult, fine, but everyone else is allowed to laugh at you for it.
Very influential
Let me say that I have never seen and don’t have great interest in a lot of Scorsese’s work. I understand he’s respected. I would rather watch Captain America than Casino. That being said- I remember when his comments were first reported on. I mean, he was being interviewed. I’m not a fan of his but has Scorsese not earned the right to have his opinion? The fan outrage at being offended- it’s ridiculous. Ignore what you don’t like. Savor what you do. The people that won’t get it never will. Do you get it? That’s what counts.
I have never liked Scorcese and I have never seen any of his films. Having said that, ‘’cinema’’ in other countries is just another word for motion pictures, and a word that distinguishes them from still pictures, which used to be taken on film cameras.The problems is that many obnoxious hoity-toity turds like Scorcese use ‘’cinema’’ instead of ‘’films’’ to express displeasure at things they do not think is deserving of even being released. For me that would be all of Scorcese’s FILMS.