The British newspaper The Guardian surprised us today with an interview with Martin Scorsese entitled in a disconcerting way: "Martin Scorsese: ' The Irishman is perhaps the last film I will make.'"
It's puzzling because filming for his next movie, Killers of the Flower Moon (starring Leonardo DiCaprio), was recently announced for March, and puzzling because, well, we're talking about Scorsese. A living legend of cinema.
In a lengthy interview filled with noteworthy gems like " Shutter Island " or "The Aviator " wouldn't be possible today, Scorsese once again protested the hegemony of superhero films. It was during this latest outpouring of emotion that the 77-year-old Italian-American dropped the bombshell regarding " The Irishman," his celebrated (and by some, criticized) release this year, starring De Niro, Pacino, and Pesci, and running for three and a half hours:
Theaters are run by superhero movies, you know, just people flying and hitting and crashing, and that's fine if you want to see that. Simply what happens is that there is no room for other types of movies. I don't know how many more I can do. Maybe it is already. The last. The idea was to at least be able to make it and maybe show it one day at the NFT, maybe one day at the Cinémathèque de Paris. I'm not kidding".
Scorsese has thus responded to a question from journalist Andrew Pulver in which he recalled the autumn controversy on account of Scorsese's noisy criticism of Marvel (which received the support of Francis Ford Coppola).
“We are right now in a scenario where theaters are only showing superhero movies. Of twelve theaters, eleven are for a superhero movie. Do you like superhero movies? Okay, but do you need eleven rooms? It's crazy for movies like, you know, Lady Bird or The Souvenir. Those movies may not necessarily be very commercial, but they are modest, genuine movies that find a large audience. Just because a film is commercial doesn't mean it can't be art. What has consumed theaters is the product. A product is consumed and thrown away. Watch a commercial movie like Singin' in the Rain. You can watch it over and over again. So the question is: how are we going to protect the art?
The answer, if there is one, must be sought in people like Quentin Tarantino or Christopher Nolan, who has just released the trailer for his new film, Tenet.