The Cinema of Martin Scorsese Essays

The Cinema of Martin Scorsese Essays The Cinema of Martin Scorsese Essay The Cinema of Martin Scorsese Essay Having emerged as the key figure of Hollywood cinema in the 1970s, Martin Scorsese is one of those personalities of Hollywood who considers film making to be a religion above anything else – one that he staunchly follows and reveres. This is a fact apparent in his school of film making which not only affected drastic changes but also ushered in a whole new ear of emotionally intelligent film making, especially in the genre of crime drama. In 1969, Scorsese embarked upon the start of his journey as a film maker with ‘Who’s that knocking at my door?’ where he went from being an ordinary hand at the editing table straight to the director’s chair. This was followed by notable efforts on his part where his talent as director shone through in memorable films like Mean Streets, Bringing out the dead, Raging bull, Last temptation of the Christ, Boxcar Bertha, the hugely acclaimed Kundun and more recently, Gangs of New York. If one were to take a deeper look into his body of work, the brightly lit pace of most of his plot lines would become apparent even through the more obvious grey tones that seem to underscore most of his movies. Let’s face it – you think Scorsese; you think grey. This brings directly to the two movies we are about to compare. The first one is Scorsese’s debut ‘Who’s that knocking at my door’ while the other is ‘Mean streets’, a movie that was close on the heels of the first. Who’s that knocking at my door, is believed by many to be a trial run for his later classics like Mean Streets and Taxi Driver. But the fact remains that this story of a boy in search of his identity when it comes to marrying the woman he loved – the woman who is scarred for life by rape – is a strong and compelling story to tell. Originally titled, I call first, this movie delivers many clever flourishes and novel ideas, despite the critical panning that observed lack of proper correlation between the scenes. This movie was written by Martin Scorsese himself and was released on the 15th of November, 1969. (www.wikipedia.com) Structured on a budget of $75,000 within a running time of 90 minutes, this movie calls the viewers attention to an easy flow of details and large doses of realist effects embedded in its overall mise en scà ¨n. Mean Streets is said to be a triumph of personal film making in context of its unparalleled demonstration of the power a film to convey reality. This movie was one of Scorsese’s early films starring Harvey Kietel and Robert De Niro. A notable feature of this movie is that although, the plot revolves around Italian American, there were only two Italians on the cast, i.e. Robert De Niro and Cesare DaNova. Released on the 2nd of October, 1973 after being made on a budget of $500,000, this movie boasts of a plethora of stars in its 110 minute runtime. This film’s story revolves essentially around an Italian American man eager to move up the ladder in the local mob, before he realizes that his strict catholic upbringing makes him too forgiving by nature to be successful in the mob. Coming to the formal similarities between the two films, one would first have to define the range of formal similarities. These similarities are to do with aspects of film making like the treatment of the movie, setting, lighting, performances, among various other factors. For facilitation of smooth flowing information throughout this paper, we will chart out these similarities in context of creative orientation. To start with, the characterization as well as the characters of both movies bears distinct similarities. Considering the fact the screenplay for Mean Streets initially began as a continuation of the characters in his first film, Who’s that knocking at my door, one will find that the J.R of Who’s that, and Charlie of Mean Streets could very well be brothers up in arms, against the whole world and their metal plight more than anything else. Who’s that boasts of a dynamic performance by Harvey Keitel as the very troubled and confused J.R, as his debut. Meanwhile, Charlie of Mean Streets is almost heart wrenching in his journey from innocence to full knowledge of the fact that he is not cut out to purse a career in the mob. He thus grows up in his own innocent way. Moving on, there is a strong underscore of themes of catholic guilt throughout the plotlines of both films which insert autobiographical elements into the movies. There are also Italian American sentiments on the agendas of both films in the sense that Scorsese manages quite effectively, to bring to life, what he saw growing up on the streets of Little Italy. Further, both films make for great viewing in the sense that it is amazingly enjoyable to go back in time and experience the shades that marked the horizon of life’s everyday nuances during the 60s. This has been done rather efficiently by Scorsese in both films – whether it is the look, the feel or even the sound of the movie. Even more distinct are the ragged edges of the plots and characters as they go about the all important business of living turbulent lives in that era. Also, the dialogues are beautifully crafted for the characters in both films. For example, in a scene from Who’s that, JR is seen coyly trying to strike up a conversation with a young lady on the ferry. The are able to develop a conversation even though they figuratively speak different languages him from the street; her a more cultured background. Another similarity would have to be on the camera work. Fluid and dramatic is how every movie buff worth his salt would explain the camera work of both films. Apart from this, the beautifully crafted dialogues for his characters mark both films. Heres one example from Who’s that: In one scene, a butcher is seen chopping meat and the camera is looking through a window. The camera pulls back and back and back until you realize its placed on a tall building across the street. But then entering from the stage right on the sidewalk far below, are two characters in the movie, the camera picks up on them then slowly zooms back to follow their actions. Brilliant is not the word. Apart from these similarities are the ones surrounding a kind of realism that Scorsese inevitably lends to all of his films and not just these two in particular, making it apparent that he has lived through some pretty harsh realities in life. Besides this, the fact that comes across clearly in both movies is one that has to do with the medium budget, artisanal, personal film making that characterized the 70s. Most of the key scenes in Mean Streets were almost fully improvised, thus sounding far more authentic than the old-style, theatrical delivery used in most American films up to that time. The actors speech is so profanity-ridden that no screenwriter of the time could have possibly doctored anything even close.