THE BIGGER PICTURE
Directors who bash superhero movies miss point, Michael Cavna writes.
The yawn of the news cycle around each “look who’s bashing superhero movies now” flare-up reads like a rote script from an inferior franchise sequel:
1. An iconic New Hollywood filmmaker (or similar) makes a negative comment about superhero movies.
2. Media outlets quote the shade and any prominent response.
3. Social media hyperventilates like kids on the playground shouting, “Fight, fight!” — while largely ignoring the bigger picture.
The most recent case stars Francis Ford Coppola, who ratcheted up the disparaging comments about superhero movies made early this month (and reiterated soon after) by his fellow Oscar-winning luminary, Martin Scorsese.
Because Step No. 2 is obligatory to move forward, here’s the recap: The Irishman director Scorsese said superhero films, as studios such as Marvel create, are “not cinema,” likening such movies more to theme-park entertainment. Then, Godfather director Coppola, speaking while being honoured at recent the Lumière festival in Lyon, France, intensified matters by saying: “Martin was being kind when he said it wasn’t cinema. He didn’t say it was despicable, which is what I say.”
Scorsese then re-upped his concerns at the recent Rome Film Festival, saying “the ‘amusement park’ comic books films, they’re taking over the theatres. They can have those films and it’s fine, but that shouldn’t become what our young people believe is cinema.”
Iron Man director Jon Favreau responded to the directors’ comments, telling CNBC he isn’t offended, as Coppola and Scorsese have “earned the right to express their opinions.”
But why do film fans even care so hotly about what the two towering auteurs have to say about the contents of a mainstream superhero movie — especially given Scorsese’s admission that he doesn’t watch them? Would we care if a decorated chef like Joël Robuchon or Gordon Ramsay said he lacked a personal taste for even the world’s best hot buttered popcorn, generally flavoured to appeal to the most people possible?
All this unfolds as the Todd Phillips non-superhero superhero movie Joker — to which Scorsese was attached early on as a producer — becomes one of the highest-grossing R-rated movies ever, with its heavy homage to Scorsese’s urban alienation films.
Joker reminds us that superhero stories can be fertile ground for reinvention and adaptation, just as creators at the dawn of the superhero industry were inspired by long hours in the theatre, watching noir and gangster movies.
Superhero fans simply don’t need the paternal approval of these Hollywood godfathers, especially when superheroes, alongside animated movies and Disney-vault reboots, dominate the box office each year. As the chorus goes in this era of the Us$22-billion Marvel movie machine, “the nerds won” — even as old cultural grudges die hard.
Some observers have called this a superhero “debate,” but that’s hardly the case. What we’re really hearing are the sporadic shots of symptomatic frustration, worry and concern amid huge industry upheaval. Beyond the shallow news squibs about Coppola and Scorsese’s insults, the filmmaking greats are speaking to larger trends that certainly merit their sentiments and insights.
At heart, Coppola is trying to champion what he considers personal stories. Scorsese and Coppola first thrived as the old Hollywood studio system died, coming up in an age of the auteur, and that’s the personal prism through which they’re witnessing just how many screens are devoted to interlocking universes that require the significant presence of the big studio’s hand.
“If you make art that’s not personal, it’s a sin,” Coppola said in Lyon. “When I was hired to do The Godfather, I tried to do something that was personal.”
The reality of major modern filmmaking is that so few movies not adapted from existing intellectual properties ever become blockbusters — and theatre owners need their blockbusters to fill those seats. (Even big-budget non-superhero movies like Gemini Man and Maleficent: Mistress of Evil are underperforming.)
Meanwhile, Scorsese offered a money quote that got too little coverage as his film The Irishman, which is backed by Netflix, closed the London Film Festival.
Scorsese said, according to
The Associated Press, that the rise of streaming platforms has become “an even bigger revolution than sound brought to cinema” because it “opens up the original conception of what a film is.
“Homes are becoming theatres, too,” Scorsese said, “but it’s a major change, and I think one has to keep an open mind.”
Scorsese might be getting playful with the hyperbole, but the point’s the same: Filmmakers will go where the opportunities are, and millions of viewers will go where the most interesting stories are being told.
Superhero movies will eventually yield dominance to another genre — but what other genre will keep some theatre owners from financial straits?
As The Washington Post reported last year, movie-ticket revenue was up eight per cent for 2018 — but well more than one-third of that revenue came “from just 10 films, out of the more than 700 released during the year.
“And it’s primarily just two categories — superhero adventures and animated films — keeping the numbers afloat.”
Scorsese knows the new Hollywood reality as well as anyone. So even as he sounds frustrated over what Disney franchises monopolize the multiplex, he looks to new streaming platforms, keeping an open mind about where to find his next open wallets.