Scorsese compared MCU to modern theme park. What is your angle on it?

[heart0less]

Here are Martin Scorsese's words:        [the magazine in question is Empire Magazine]

 

Surely, people are outraged.

 

But, in my view, he is quite right.

He took care not to hurt the MCU creators by saying: 'as well made as they are', so I don't see why he is accused of being insulting.

[Andrew Reid]

MCU?

[Emanuel]

Marvel, Andrew : )

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvel_Cinematic_Universe

 

I FULLY agree with him : -) That's disgusting content, as simple as that. Fortunately, cinema will never be destroyed by these silly attempts to pollute our time and universe... : P

 

Funny you Andrew didn't notice the acronym if not ultimate sarcasm : D which is symptomatic everything is not yet lost, after all, there's still hope for this planet ; -)

So BTW, I don't even watch them either!

[KnightsFan]

Wow, that is the most accurate summary of the MCU that I've seen. Like Scorsese says, they are not poorly made. Most MCU movies are clearly made with a lot of care and loving attention to detail, just not the details us snobs are looking for. Conveying "emotional, psychological experiences" is their antithesis. There's just the faintest scattering of storytelling: 3 acts, a villain, a half dozen callbacks to Act 1 in Act 3, and the rest is precisely a theme park ride. There is no attempt to communicate an abstract idea or feeling, all information presented by the movie is describing events as they occur, humorous one liners*, and information about the exact extents of a character's physical capabilities.

And it's not that fantasy or blockbuster movies are necessarily theme parkish. The Lord of the Rings conveyed an enormous amount of emotion. The Star Wars prequels -tried- to convey emotion, but were hit or miss on execution. Nolan's Batman films were entirely character driven, delivering on the psychological experience moreso than emotional.

*With the exception of Thor Ragnarok, and moments in Guardians, the one liners aren't even character-based. Any character could say any of the jokes and it would make sense. I'll also say that Thor is the only MCU movie I've seen that has recurring character jokes that genuinely advance our understanding of the characters and work off of previous content.

[Mako Sports]

A lot of the Marvel shows/tv shows are shite.

But the Netlfix Punisher series was good as fuck.

[JurijTurnsek]

The whole super-hero thing never registered with me, even as a child. The only one I could invest some interest in is Batman, since he is supposedly just a very fit human with gadgets. But even his gadgets can get extremely unrealistic, so ...

MCU aside, this is true for the whole action movie genre - I cannot believe, I was able to sit through them as a kid. No substance, just some action with the protagonist wearing plot armor.

[ntblowz]

[kye]

 

[kaylee]

10 hours ago, ntblowz said:

OMG 

[kaylee]

tbh Martin Scorsese is too dumb to understand that there are 1.386 billion paying customers in China, and making borderline retarded movies that a non English speaking child can easily understand is how you put asses every 18 inches........

 

 

 

IN CHINA

[barefoot_dp]

I'm almost certain you're being tongue in cheek - but I'm sure Scorsese understands that very well. He'd just rather put his efforts into films that he sees as artistically more fulfilling, rather than another interchangeable smokescreen that is designed purely to put more money into the studios pockets. And I think he's earned the right to pick and choose his projects by this point (not to mention he's earned enough that he can put time into projects he loves over ones that are more profitable).

I agree with him, and have personally not bothered to watch any of them recently unless I'm flying and I need something brainless that I can only half pay attention to. It's just rinse and repeat, for the most part - but often that is what audiences want most (unfortunately!). I just hate the way that every super-hero movie (or other franchise) these days seems like they're are just a teaser for the next movie. It feel like many movies' entire purpose was to introduce a new character, just so that character can have their own stand-alone movie. But that stand alone movie always ends up being the teaser for another new character on the endless treadmill.

[kye]

2 hours ago, kaylee said:

tbh Martin Scorsese is too dumb to understand that there are 1.386 billion paying customers in China, and making borderline retarded movies that a non English speaking child can easily understand is how you put asses every 18 inches........

 

 

 

IN CHINA

$40M USD at the box office cannot be wrong....

[BTM_Pix]

I've never seen any of them and, like @Andrew Reid, hadn't even heard of the acronym MCU outside of it being the name of a control surface for a DAW.

The closest I've come to seeing something similar would be Aquaman but thats only because it was in 4DX and, as 4DX is my guilty secret, I leave behind all pretence of it being art at the door and will literally watch any old shit as long as my seat is being thrown round, water is spraying on me and blasts of air are coming from the seat in front of me throughout.

That confirms Scorsese's view of there being a theme park aspect to this stuff as I would no more watch Aquaman at home again on my TV than I would leap off the wardrobe to simulate being on the Haunted Mansion ride.

I don't think there's any problem with both types of film existing though or enjoying both in equal measure as it depends on the circumstances.

Its no different to music where I can prefer to listen to Talking Heads or the Cocteaus or the Bunnymen or whatever in the comfort of my own attic but that doesn't stop me shaking my arse to a bit of Abba at a family party.

In the case of the latter, it very much is like 4DX for anyone unfortunate enough to be sat in the vicinity of me shaking my fat old arse during Dancing Queen as they do indeed experience a similar effect of chair shaking, liquid dousing and unexpected blasts of wind hitting them.

[Oliver Daniel]

I’ve seen most superhero movies as I enjoy them (they are really fun to watch) and I do somewhat agree. Most of them have the same plot too:

- A character in peril realises they are powerful and uses it to do good like save a cat. 

- A bad guy wants to blow up a city or similar   because that’s a great plan. 

- The hero wins but someone close to them dies, because y’know, emotion. 

 

There are exceptions to the trend that I highly recommend: 

- Logan 

- Daredevil (Netflix) 

- The Boys (Amazon) 

- Super 

- Dark Knight Trilogy 

[thebrothersthre3]

3 hours ago, Oliver Daniel said:

I’ve seen most superhero movies as I enjoy them (they are really fun to watch) and I do somewhat agree. Most of them have the same plot too:

- A character in peril realises they are powerful and uses it to do good like save a cat. 

- A bad guy wants to blow up a city or similar   because that’s a great plan. 

- The hero wins but someone close to them dies, because y’know, emotion. 

 

There are exceptions to the trend that I highly recommend: 

- Logan 

- Daredevil (Netflix) 

- The Boys (Amazon) 

- Super 

- Dark Knight Trilogy 

I thought Punisher and Jessica Jones S1 were amazing too.

I am not a huge Marvel fan but Guardians of the Galaxy 2 always hits home for me. Great movie imo

[leslie]

i must be shallow, i have nearly the whole set on dvd?. I find them lighthearted entertainment. Life throws enough drama my way during the day, i dont need to watch more of it on a screen at night. I guess i'm after the escapism aspect most are so far fetched  thats it a load off the mind for awhile. Perhaps thats just me.

i reckon barefoot_dp might be onto something with his theory, but its an industry it gives people a job, so who am i to begrudge them and they get paid for it some more than others no doubt ?

edit : my first thoughts were that this is a mature age gent from a different era and i'd expect his views to represent that, and i am fine with that, but then i think of stan lee who wrote alot of this comic stuff he was also a mature aged gent. So now i'm thinking its like a perspective, none are really wrong its just what works for the individual.

[kye]

I was thoroughly enjoying Rise Of The Silver Surfer right up until the silver surfer spoke for the first time.

I was thinking how cool it would be to have a plucky gang of heroes get so completely out-classed that their foe doesn't even acknowledge they exist.  Having a complete action film occur and still be wondering WTF the bad guy was would be absolutely brilliant.

Please, someone make that film.

[mkabi]

8 hours ago, leslie said:

i must be shallow, i have nearly the whole set on dvd?. I find them lighthearted entertainment. Life throws enough drama my way during the day, i dont need to watch more of it on a screen at night. I guess i'm after the escapism aspect most are so far fetched  thats it a load off the mind for awhile. Perhaps thats just me.

Same here. The grim realities of life... I used to work at a nursing home, people would die on me atleast once a month, the most I've experienced is 3 times a week, others would bitch at me, upper management would yell at me for some shit, the elderly would yell at me for some other shit... 

Escapism it is!!! ? But, I don't own the whole set, some of the first ones for sure...

Each to his/her own.... everyone has different tastes, I like hip hop, RnB and pop music; if you're into alternative, rock, techno, house, trap, country, who am I to judge???

[fuzzynormal]

"It isn't the cinema of human beings."

He's right, literally. 

[HockeyFan12]

I think Marvel movies (other than Iron Man) have a similar style of storytelling to recent Spielberg movies (and Transformers movies). Instead of there being a character arc for the protagonist and that being the focus of the story, there's an external threat and then some elite heroic force stands up to that threat and stops it (could be Iron Man standing up to Thanos, could be Lincoln standing up against slavery).

To that extent, these are movies about rejecting external change rather than they are about embracing personal change.

That kind of story appeals to me less. 

(Not that I'm advocating for either slavery or for Thanos.)

Even with older blockbusters like Armageddon where there is an external threat, it's about the "everyman" standing up to save the day when NASA can't. Or in Enemy of the State it's the individual vs the establishment–this is the trend in the 90s imo, populism. And there's usually an accompanying character arc. With recent Marvel movies, and recent Spielberg movies, and maybe just recent studio pictures in general.... it's the "elites" saving the everyman. And often the only arc is the everyman learning to embrace the "elites" while they expel whatever outside force threatens the everyman...

But I also agree about MCU being extremely well made... I dunno, structurally it reminds me more of tv, which it basically is. Or sports–watching your team trounce the other team.

But credit where it's due–you'd expect MCU fans to pile on Scorsese and vice versa, but it seems the discourse has been civil and intelligent. I used to think the appeal of MCU was watching your team beat up the other team. Maybe it's more complex than that and MCU fans are more sophisticated, and ironically it's Scorsese positing an elitist us vs them framework here.