Matt’s backing Martin

The Departed and Thor: Ragnarok actor weighs in on the Marvel v Martin Scorsese debate. Gary Thompson reports.

Matt Damon, star of Ford v Ferrari, is also right in the middle of another heated rivalry, Marvel v Martin. That’s the smackdown between Marvel Studios and Martin Scorsese – the legendary director (The Irishman) who recently said the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies did not qualify as cinema or art, took some heat for it, then doubled down with an essay repeating and refining his position.

The Marvel movies are by definition unoriginal, he wrote: ‘‘Everything in them is officially sanctioned because it can’t really be any other way. That’s the nature of modern film franchises: market-researched, audience-tested, vetted, modified, revetted and remodified until they’re ready for consumption.’’

Damon is in a unique position to referee, as he’s one of the few stars who has worked for Scorsese (The Departed) and Marvel (Thor: Ragnarok). And he’s deeply sympathetic to the point of view of Scorsese, whose work, ironically, was the artistic inspiration for Joker.

‘‘I think it’s understandable that some of the film-makers in the old guard would be concerned, because [Marvel] movies take up so much real estate,’’ Damon says. ‘‘I think he’s lamenting a generation of filmgoers being acculturated to believe that’s what movies are – and that’s all they are. He’s thinking of the movies he loves, the movies that he’s made, and he knows that nobody’s making them any more.’’

Damon is quick to add that Marvel is clearly giving the marketplace what it wants, but he said the changing nature of that marketplace is changing movies. ‘‘The movies that have the best chance of making a lot of money are the movies that travel around the world. Those are the movies with the least amount of cultural confusion, the least amount of language.

‘‘So, you’re talking about superhero movies, which are graspable everywhere. There’s a good guy and a bad guy, they fight three times, the good guy wins twice, and you go home,’’ he says.

‘‘And people never seem to tire of seeing that story and, to people like Scorsese, that’s what’s so frightening. He feels that the point of cinema is to expose us to the moral uncertainty and emotional confusion of real life, which is not a binary contrast of good and bad, but something more nuanced and complex.’’

It’s why Damon wanted to make Ford v Ferrari, the fact-based account of Ford Motor Company’s all-out bid in the mid-1960s to end the Ferrari domination of the international racing scene.

To build a winning car, staid Ford turned to maverick racer/designer Carroll Shelby (Damon), who, in turn, recruited an erratic driver and engineer, Ken Miles (Christian Bale), to pilot one of Shelby’s now-legendary vehicles in 1966 during the decisive 24-hour race at Le Mans.

‘‘I think it’s understandable that some of the film-makers in the old guard would be concerned, because [Marvel] movies take up so much real estate.’’

Matt Damon