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Scorsese slams MCU
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221 posts in this topic

9 hours ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Completely disagree. The MCU gets a lot of attention and a lot of rocks thrown at it because it makes so much money, but a lot of movies with theatrical releases are still the boring drama character movies that win awards. Look at the list of Best Picture nominees for the Oscars last year. Most of them are character dramas, including Black Panther.

Also, television and streaming services like Netflix pick up a lot of the slack of more character based drama. Mini-series are kind of a thing now, like the excellent Fargo on FX. The art of film and cinema doesn't have to be exclusively a theater release. 

No. I would say the reason why the MCU attracts negative attention is the behavior of its fanbase where they assume it's required to attack competing productions. Leading to excessive back-and-forth fights. It sure didn't help right from the beginning the first big star of the franchise came out negative, inspiring fans to follow along.

Robert Downey Jr On “The Dark Knight”: “F@*$ DC Comics” (2008)

Or when its stars ridicule film reviewers for liking DC films, and telling them if they appreciate such films they must be a poor reviewer.

Let's pretend the poor MCU was the kid on the Hollywood playground being beat up by the bullies. It feels like the headline to get behind. With big MCU blinders on to assist. (:

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7 minutes ago, Bosco685 said:

And I'm a big fan of MCU films, and even my stomach turns when I read and see these things. Like I'm supposed to dislike DC or other studios to show my appreciation and fealty. :facepalm:

That's a new one for me, I had to look it up, seemingly have probably heard it before but lol i wouldn't have had the opportunity to use it :foryou:

 

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3 minutes ago, ADAMANTIUM said:

That's a new one for me, I had to look it up, seemingly have probably heard it before but lol i wouldn't have had the opportunity to use it :foryou:

 

My job is done for the day. :acclaim:

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Halloween is coming soon, kids. Remember Count Dracula loves you. He's counting on it. Get it? Counting. :insane:

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  • Scorsese's opinion that MCU films are not 'cinema' seems to hinge on his definition of what cinema actually is ...

“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema,” Scorsese told Empire magazine. “Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

Some questions to consider ...

  • Is 'good' cinema the conveyance of emotional, psychological experiences to other human beings? Are these types of experiences present in none/some/most/all of the MCU films?
  • Are these experiences conveyed between characters in the film? From characters in the film to the audience/viewers? Both?
  • Is there an accurate way of measuring (?) the effectiveness of the conveyance?
  • Is this the only criteria for 'good' cinema?
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4 minutes ago, BuscemasAvengers said:
  • Scorsese's opinion that MCU films are not 'cinema' seems to hinge on his definition of what cinema actually is ...

“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema,” Scorsese told Empire magazine. “Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

Some questions to consider ...

  • Is 'good' cinema the conveyance of emotional, psychological experiences to other human beings? Are these types of experiences present in none/some/most/all of the MCU films?
  • Are these experiences conveyed between characters in the film? From characters in the film to the audience/viewers? Both?
  • Is there an accurate way of measuring (?) the effectiveness of the conveyance?
  • Is this the only criteria for 'good' cinema?

Yes. No. Maybe. Idk.

None of those answers are in order of the question(s) asked...

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1 hour ago, Bosco685 said:

No. I would say the reason why the MCU attracts negative attention is the behavior of its fanbase where they assume it's required to attack competing productions. Leading to excessive back-and-forth fights. It sure didn't help right from the beginning the first big star of the franchise came out negative, inspiring fans to follow along.

Robert Downey Jr On “The Dark Knight”: “F@*$ DC Comics” (2008)

Or when its stars ridicule film reviewers for liking DC films, and telling them if they appreciate such films they must be a poor reviewer.

Let's pretend the poor MCU was the kid on the Hollywood playground being beat up by the bullies. It feels like the headline to get behind. With big MCU blinders on to assist. (:

Oh, good lord, this interview with Anthony Mackie is just a fun back and forth, and he's known for being a cut-up on camera. Can the court please dismiss this as evidence now? Anyway...

Hardcore MCU fans don't need to attack DCEU movies to bring them down because DCEU movies do that on their own lol

And yes, when Marvel Studios first made Iron Man, they were almost an independent studio taking a gamble on a super-hero property that hadn't been proven yet in movies and there was no big super-hero movie trend to push folks into movie theaters. Heck, all the MCU movies leading up to the first Avengers movies were small productions. It was only after the success of the first Avengers movie, which proved Marvel's expanded universe experiment worked, that the MCU began to transform into the worldwide box office behemoth it is today and has film legends like Martin Scorsese throwing stones...

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7 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Oh, good lord, this interview with Anthony Mackie is just a fun back and forth, and he's known for being a cut-up on camera. Can the court please dismiss this as evidence now? Anyway...

Hardcore MCU fans don't need to attack DCEU movies to bring them down because DCEU movies do that on their own lol

And yes, when Marvel Studios first made Iron Man

Spoiler

, they were almost an independent studio taking a gamble on a super-hero property that hadn't been proven yet in movies and there was no big super-hero movie trend to push folks into movie theaters. Heck, all the MCU movies leading up to the first Avengers movies were small productions. It was only after the success of the first Avengers movie, which proved Marvel's expanded universe experiment worked, that the MCU began to transform into the worldwide box office behemoth it is today

and has film legends like Martin Scorsese throwing stones...

emotion01.gif.3e1914a53a26c325ad733f18dc56e5b4.gif

:baiting:

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9 hours ago, dupont2005 said:

Black Panther isn’t a character drama. I actually spent a fair bit of time researching top ten international box office releases over the course of 40 years. This is what I got 

1979 - 1 sequel

1980 - 2 sequels

1981 - 3 sequels 

1982 - 2 sequels

1983 - 2 sequels 

1984 - 2 sequels

1985 - 2 sequels

1986 - 3 sequels

1987 - 1 sequel

1988 - 1 sequel

Average of 1.9 sequels per year. Low of 1, high of 3

1989 - 4 sequels

1990 - 2 sequels

1991 - 2 sequels

1992 - 3 sequels

1993 - no sequels 

1994 - no sequels 

1995 - 4 sequels 

1996 - 1 sequel 

1997 - 2 sequels

1998 - no sequels

Average of 1.8 sequels per year. Low of 0, high of 4

1999 - 3 sequels

2000 - 1 sequel

2001 - 3 sequels

2002 - 7 sequels

2003 - 5 sequels

2004 - 5 sequels

2005 - 3 sequels

2006 - 5 sequels 

2007 - 5 sequels

2008 - 5 sequels

Average of 4.2 sequels per year. Low of 1, high of 7. First year with majority sequels

2009 - 6 sequels

2010 - 5 sequels

2011 - 9 sequels

2012 - 7 sequels

2013 - 8 sequels

2014 - 8 sequels

2015 - 6 sequels

2016 - 8 sequels

2017 - 10 sequels

2018 - 10 sequels

Average of 7.7 sequels per year. Low of 5, high of 10. First decade without a year with majority original content. First year with all sequels. First decade with majority average.

For convenience I listed all franchise movies and remakes as “sequels” on the list. So modern live action Disney remakes of classic cartoons, like Jungke Book, are counted among them. Franchise movies considered sequels, so all 007 movies. I didn’t count the first entry in a series intended to become a franchise, so the first Lord Of The Rings or Harry Potter movie won’t be included. Cheech & Chong’s Nice Dreams considered a sequel here, even though there appears to be no continuity and the characters don’t have the same names they did in Up In Smoke. Moviegoers knew what they were getting when they went, and that was the point. Star Wars Episode IV not considered a sequel. Worldwide box office used from the-numbers.com. 2002 Spider-Man counted but 1990 Batman didn’t. The Batman serials weren’t really movies, and the Adam West movie was a TV adaptation, so I consider the 1990 Batman movie to be the “first” Batman movie, and not a part of an existing franchise, TV adaptations not counted, so the Simpson’s movie not counted, Smurf's not counted. All MCU movies counted. Marvel feature cartoons not counted if a first entry, big hero 6 not counted. IT counted but maybe it shouldn’t have since the miniseries wasn’t a movie. Oh well. DC superhero movies counted except 1990 Batman since Superman. I counted Wonder Woman

 

what TV does is irrelevant to the discussion. It is not a matter of opinion that sequels, remakes, and franchise movies have taken over Hollywood. 

 

Thanks for that, and it's interesting to see the trend of franchise films increase over the decades.

However, I still don't think it's an indicator that the quality of movies has gone down. I think it's more an indicator of the amount of content being pushed out by both the major and independent studios. Another informative study to be done would be to see the ratio of these sequel and franchise movies to the overall quantity of movies given a theatrical release. That doesn't even count the amount of films one can see at the hundreds of film festivals that have sprung up across the country, that go straight to home video or streaming, or that you see on TV. I think the ratio might show that big budget action franchise movies still make up a minor percentage of the movies produced today.

And I don't think TV is irrelevant at all to the discussion. People in general don't care how they get their movie watching experience. A lot of people actually prefer to see movies at home. Filmmakers and production studios also don't care, in the end, how their work gets shown to the public. As long as it gets shown and they can get paid somehow.

It was only a few years ago that a relatively little 2 million dollar movie called Moonlight won Best Picture, was the hot movie to see, and made 65 million at the box office. And what was the other hot movie to see that year? La La Land, a musical, which made $450 million at the box office.

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36 minutes ago, Bosco685 said:

emotion01.gif.3e1914a53a26c325ad733f18dc56e5b4.gif

:baiting:

 

2 hours ago, Bosco685 said:

No. I would say the reason why the MCU attracts negative attention is the behavior of its fanbase where they assume it's required to attack competing productions. Leading to excessive back-and-forth fights. It sure didn't help right from the beginning the first big star of the franchise came out negative, inspiring fans to follow along.

Robert Downey Jr On “The Dark Knight”: “F@*$ DC Comics” (2008)

Or when its stars ridicule film reviewers for liking DC films, and telling them if they appreciate such films they must be a poor reviewer.

 

Going back to the Anthony Mackie one more time, I don't mean to say that the Falcon didn't honestly NOT like Man of Steel because I have to agree with him, it's not a good movie and a lot of people feel the same way (there's a reason Henry Cavill and Zach Snyder are out of DC moviemaking). But the interviewer asked him plain and simple, DC or Marvel? What response was to be expected? You ask Anthony Mackie a question and he will give his honest unadulterated answer every time. I bet Mackie will tell you he liked Wonder Woman. God bless, Sam Wilson.

Edited by @therealsilvermane
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1 hour ago, BuscemasAvengers said:
  • Scorsese's opinion that MCU films are not 'cinema' seems to hinge on his definition of what cinema actually is ...

“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema,” Scorsese told Empire magazine. “Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

Some questions to consider ...

  • Is 'good' cinema the conveyance of emotional, psychological experiences to other human beings? Are these types of experiences present in none/some/most/all of the MCU films?
  • Are these experiences conveyed between characters in the film? From characters in the film to the audience/viewers? Both?
  • Is there an accurate way of measuring (?) the effectiveness of the conveyance?
  • Is this the only criteria for 'good' cinema?

As much as 'Goodfellas' was one of the best movies ever made and Scorsese only had Henry Hill to work off of, and I've watched the movie at least 3 times a year since its release, it didn't convey the truth of the Mafia, it was rife with mistakes, at times the dialogue was confusing like when Hill is narrating Morie's death, also what type of Gangster pulling million dollar scores is telling his wife to go on welfare when he is in the bin?

In that regards the psychological message Scorsese is trying to convey is that crime pays, which it does not, both psychologically and financially.

Scorsese is being dishonest, and choosing sides.

Hollywood is about money, always has been and always will be, and if a film can fetch you a billion dollars than it's a damn fine film.

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4 minutes ago, Hollywood1892 said:

As much as 'Goodfellas' was one of the best movies ever made and Scorsese only had Henry Hill to work off of, and I've watched the movie at least 3 times a year since its release, it didn't convey the truth of the Mafia, it was rife with mistakes, at times the dialogue was confusing like when Hill is narrating Morie's death, also what type of Gangster pulling million dollar scores is telling his wife to go on welfare when he is in the bin?

In that regards the psychological message Scorsese is trying to convey is that crime pays, which it does not, both psychologically and financially.

Scorsese is being dishonest, and choosing sides.

Eh, not sure about that.

In Goodfellas, our three main characters all pay for their sins. Tommy ends up with a bullet to the brain, Jimmy ends up in jail, and Henry, who loved the good life and said regular jobs are for suckers, ends up alone in a tiny house in the suburbs under witness protection.

In Casino, which was Goodfellas on steroids, Nicky ends up being buried alive in a corn field with his brother, Ginger overdoses in a drug house, and Sam ends up where he started, as a lowly bookie.

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2 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Eh, not sure about that.

In Goodfellas, our three main characters all pay for their sins. Tommy ends up with a bullet to the brain, Jimmy ends up in jail, and Henry, who loved the good life and said regular jobs are for suckers, ends up alone in a tiny house in the suburbs under witness protection.

In Casino, which was Goodfellas on steroids, Nicky ends up being buried alive in a corn field with his brother, Ginger overdoses in a drug house, and Sam ends up where he started, as a lowly bookie.

Both great movies...just not sure he is in the right place chatting about Marvel in the way he is.

Edited by Hollywood1892
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24 minutes ago, Hollywood1892 said:
2 hours ago, BuscemasAvengers said:
  • Scorsese's opinion that MCU films are not 'cinema' seems to hinge on his definition of what cinema actually is ...

“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema,” Scorsese told Empire magazine. “Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

Some questions to consider ...

  • Is 'good' cinema the conveyance of emotional, psychological experiences to other human beings? Are these types of experiences present in none/some/most/all of the MCU films?
  • Are these experiences conveyed between characters in the film? From characters in the film to the audience/viewers? Both?
  • Is there an accurate way of measuring (?) the effectiveness of the conveyance?
  • Is this the only criteria for 'good' cinema?

As much as 'Goodfellas' was one of the best movies ever made and Scorsese only had Henry Hill to work off of, and I've watched the movie at least 3 times a year since its release, it didn't convey the truth of the Mafia, it was rife with mistakes, at times the dialogue was confusing like when Hill is narrating Morie's death, also what type of Gangster pulling million dollar scores is telling his wife to go on welfare when he is in the bin?

In that regards the psychological message Scorsese is trying to convey is that crime pays, which it does not, both psychologically and financially.

Scorsese is being dishonest, and choosing sides.

Hollywood is about money, always has been and always will be, and if a film can fetch you a billion dollars than it's a damn fine film.

Careful what you say, you find yourself on a deserted island with Avatar and Titanic. :baiting:

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On 10/14/2019 at 12:43 PM, theCapraAegagrus said:

I understand what he's saying - and I can't outright say that he's "wrong". Outside of some choice few - MCU films' storytelling is pretty bad. Their characters are the draw. They typically just punch their way out of their problems. The stories don't lend many life lessons. They're escapism flicks, though, and serve their purpose (mostly) for that.

As much as I think Endgame is a fantastic film, it doesn't mean anything. It says, "if time travel exist(ed), then you use that to fix your problems instead of dealing with the weight of your failure". That's not to say it's completely devoid of some lessons, like sacrifice, but it's really just a method of entertainment.

Back in Martin's day, most films had meaningful messages. You can see by all the drek released nowadays that those times are long gone. He's thinking too hard about it, though. Back in his day, the technology didn't exist to make these successful visual spectacles. Escapism can be just as useful a tool as a movie with a moral message.

As much as I like Scorsese, and agree with some of your points, this perspective suffers badly from amnesia. May I particularly remind Scorsese that without the MCU, we'd be stuck in the perpetual loop of "remakes", which in my mind signalled like nothing else, the fact that Hollywood long ago gave up on caring about stories, moral messages, etc, and became obsessed with making bankable films.

Edited by comicwiz
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6 minutes ago, Mr Sneeze said:

Careful what you say, you find yourself on a deserted island with Avatar and Titanic. :baiting:

I guess it depends on the mood...lol

I would also judge a movie based on its watchability(not really a word).

Goodfellas watchable over and over again

Casino not so much

Endgame over and over again

Infinity war over and over again 

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2 minutes ago, comicwiz said:

As much as I like Scorcese, and agree with some of your points, this perspective suffers badly from amnesia. May I particularly remind Scorcese that without the MCU, we'd be stuck in the perpetual loop of "remakes", which in my mind signaled like nothing else the fact that Hollywood long gave up on caring.

What? We're stuck in this loop already. Almost everything that isn't a comic/sci-fi film is a remake or off-shoot.

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