Martin Scorsese Issues Call ‘Save Cinema’ From Franchises

Martin Scorsese is an extremely well-respected director in almost all circles. If anyone gets to issue audiences an ultimatum, it’s probably him. Scorsese has called out superhero movie culture before, deriding it as not being an official example of “cinema.” With the way superhero movie releases have been going lately, he might have a solid point here.

He recently spoke with GQ to talk more about how franchises and comic book movies are rotting the art form from the inside out. Scorsese said...

The danger there is what it’s doing to our culture. Because there are going to be generations now that think movies are only those — that’s what movies are. They already think that. Which means that we have to then fight back stronger. And it’s got to come from the grassroots level. It’s gotta come from the filmmakers themselves. And you’ll have, you know, the Safdie brothers, and you’ll have Chris Nolan, you know what I mean? And hit ’em from all sides. Hit ’em from all sides, and don’t give up. Let’s see what you got. Go out there and do it. Go reinvent. Don’t complain about it. But it’s true because we’ve got to save cinema.

Columbia Pictures

“I do think that the manufactured content isn’t really cinema, It’s almost like AI making a film,” he added. “And that doesn’t mean that you don’t have incredible directors and special effects people doing beautiful artwork. But what does it mean? What do these films, what will it give you?”

Whether or not you think Scorsese is pretentious, or you truly value his opinion on the hallowed medium, it's impossible not to realize that he has a point worthy of discussion here. Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon opens in theaters on October 20.