The director believes cinema is currently being ‘devalued’ and ‘demeaned’ (Picture: Invision)
Director Martin Scorsese is not here for the fuss around box office takings.
The award-winning filmmaker is known for bringing titles such as Goodfellas, Shutter Island, and The Wolf of Wall Street to the big screen.
But despite his work being incredibly successful and earning him accolades including an Academy Award, three Primetime Emmys, and a Grammy, Scorsese doesn’t enjoy the ‘focus on numbers.’
The director made the point that cinema is currently being ‘devalued, demeaned, belittled from all sides, not necessarily the business side but certainly the art.’
Speaking at the New York Film Festival, Scorsese said: ‘Since the eighties, there’s been a focus on numbers. It’s kind of repulsive.’
He continued, in quotes reported by Indie Wire: ‘The cost of a movie is one thing. Understand that a film costs a certain amount, they expect to at least get the amount back, plus, again.
Martin Scorsese has worked with Leonardo DiCaprio on several occasions, including on 2016 project Shutter Island (Picture: Alex Berliner/BEI/REX/Shutterstock)
The Wolf of Wall Street crossed almost $400million in the US (Picture: Appian Way/Paramount/Kobal/Shutterstock)
‘The emphasis is now on numbers, cost, the opening weekend, how much it made in the USA, how much it made in England, how much it made in Asia, how much it made in the entire world, how many viewers it got.’
Scorsese added that as a filmmaker himself, and as a person who ‘can’t imagine life without cinema,’ he finds the focus on takings ‘really insulting.’
However, Scorsese own creations have certainly done numbers in the box office, with 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street – starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Margot Robbie – for example, grossing $392million (£348m).
He concluded by declaring his love for the New York Film Festival in particular, hailing it as a place where ‘such considerations have no place.’
Scorsese’s own films have certainly done numbers – pictured above with Andrew Garfield on the set Silence (Picture: Kerry Brown/Paramount/Kobal/Shutterstock)
Goodfellas remains one of the filmmaker’s most iconic creations (Picture: Snap/REX/Shutterstock)
‘There are no awards here. You don’t have to compete. You just have to love cinema here,’ he said.
Scorsese, 79, has long been outspoken when it comes to his views on various aspects of cinema.
In 2019, he told Empire magazine that he thinks ‘Marvel movies aren’t cinema,’ describing them as ‘closer to theme parks than they are to movies.’
He admitted he has ‘tried’ to watch them, but Marvel flicks aren’t ‘the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.’
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The Irishman director’s comments provoked outrage in Marvel fans, and he later expanded on his comments in an op-ed for the New York Times.
He said he might have found the films more appealing had he have been younger, but the fact that the films don’t interest him his ‘a matter of personal taste and temperament.’
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He thinks cinema is being ‘devalued, demeaned, and belittled from all sides.’