Struck by Killers of the Flower Moon, Martin Scorsese’s latest film, released in Romanian cinemas this fall (and still running, so you must see it!), we thought it was a good opportunity – but soon we realized it was also an almost impossible mission – to reflect on some of the most brilliant or underrated titles in the director’s filmography. While we certainly won’t manage to cover the importance and influence of his films, still, here are some films (and moments) that inspired us about the director–film teacher–the most charming octogenarian on Tik Tok, Martin Scorsese.

P.S. We recommend you to check out this interview where you can learn how Leonardo DiCaprio changed the script for Killers of the Flower Moon, but also this book that guaranteed will make for a fascinating reading – Martin Scorsese. A Journey by Mary Pat Kelly, a volume that includes several interviews with the director and the people he collaborated with on his films (Robert De Niro, Paul Newman, Liza Minnelli, Nick Nolte, and many others).

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After Hours (1985)

Paul Hackett (Griffin Dunne) has the most bizarre night of his life in After Hours, one of Martin Scorsese’s unfairly overlooked films (in its day). The feverish dream from which the protagonist cannot wake takes him to the gates of a punk club in SoHo, where he manages to get past the bouncer after an anthological, deeply Kafkaesque conversation. This adjective, overused today after Breaking Bad, can be fully applied to the film – from the detail that Paul works as a word processor to the main hook of the plot: Paul’s inability to return home. This sets the stage for the most eccentric of Scorsese’s many cameos in his films: above the dance floor where the protagonist is chased to get a mohawk haircut, the New York director, dressed in military attire, patrols with a spotlight in hand, illuminating the scene. Anthological. (Dragoș Marin)

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Hugo (2011)

Lately, I’ve become more interested in Scorsese–the cinephile and Scorsese–the film teacher. I recently dreamed that, in a heated argument on Twitter, I responded to a film buff who accused Scorsese, in reference to his comments about the Marvel movies, of elitism and promoting slow, boring, and inaccessible cinema. My subconscious came up with the following response: “Hey, buddy, do yourself a favor and watch Hugo.” Upon reflection, as much as Hugo may not shine brightly within the director’s filmography (I’m not saying it’s a great film, no, not at all), I think it’s the perfect example that Scorsese is a versatile filmmaker, both audience-friendly and open to new media – exactly contrary to what superhero movie devotees accuse him of. Hugo, Scorsese’s so-called first 3D film, is a lesson in cinema, not so much in terms of cinematic mastery but more in a scholastic sense. It’s the most basic lesson in film history you can get, specifically about Méliès and the magic of early cinema. And it’s by no means a treatise on the transmigration of the soul. In fact, it is somewhat a children’s movie, a film with fantasy gimmicks accessible to everyone – a naive fairy tale about cinema where the fair, magic, and new technologies co-exist with meaning. It can happen. The problem isn’t Scorsese, my friend. (Dora Leu)

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New York, New York (1977)

I’m starting to believe our monthly tops are pursuing more and more impossible missions (ha!): this time, to sift through Scorsese’s filmography and settle on just one title. I decided to avoid the major temptations – such as Mean Streets, an absolutely formative film for me as a cinephile; the epics Raging Bull, The Last Temptation of the Christ or Goodfellas; the meta-drama The King of Comedy, or the insane Cape Fear, which I recently revisited – and focus on this mal-aimé title which is New York, New York, released a year after Taxi Driver took Hollywood by storm. What an interesting gesture to follow such a film with a decantation of all its major influences from the Golden Age. (Here we find Hawkes, Cuckor, Sirk, Wyler – even Lubitsch.) Of course, the film’s theme song is the one that remains inscribed in the history of modern music, but let’s not forget about this great love story unfolding between smooth-talking saxophone player (de Niro, who else?) Jimmy Doyle and aspiring star Francine (Liza Minelli, both candid and majestic), which Scorsese once called “an exploration of how people with creative impulses love each other”. An absolute delight. (Flavia Dima)

* I conclude with a bonus: his famous documentary about his family – don’t miss Mamma Scorsese’s recipe for Italian meatballs!

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Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)

It’s quite challenging for me to pinpoint what I appreciate most about Scorsese, who has been a constant and major influence in my life as a cinephile. Not only have his films played a decisive role in my dream to make films, but my love for cinema is inevitably derived from his. In college, there was hardly a film history class that wasn’t accompanied by a clip from A Personal Journey or My Voyage to Italy, and his recommendations always turned into personal favorites. Then there are his interviews, especially those given to Richard Schickel. I find it fascinating to discover how he, in turn, was influenced by other films: how a background element from Scarface ended up in The Departed, how the shower scene in Psycho became the boxing scene in Raging Bull. With such a filmography, I don’t know if I can choose a favorite title, but I would go for Killers of the Flower Moon, one of his most accomplished and significant works, which I wish more people would see. It’s not necessarily my favorite scene (not when it ends the way it ends), but I was amused how one of the most memed shots in the film, with the two protagonists at the table, is taken from this superb, seemingly insignificant scene where Gladstone asks DiCaprio to be quiet for a minute and listen to the rain. Almost as charming as this TikTok. (Laurențiu Paraschiv)

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World Cinema Foundation

I’ve journeyed through many years and quite a few chapters of my personal cinephilia with Martin Scorsese, from early viewings like Goodfellas (1990) or Casino (1995) – these peaks of coolness in the eyes of the teenager (who, it must be said, was right) – to late rediscoveries, such as the massive The King of Comedy (1982). I’ve always respected Scorsese as a filmmaker, but respect, as you know, also implies a distance. I felt much closer to Scorsese–the restorer, in his role as the founder of the World Cinema Foundation (currently World Cinema Project), which since 2007 has shed light on our non-Western film canon. This is how I discovered, in versions worthy of savoring in depth, titles that prove that cinema has always been a less Eurocentric affair than one might think. From the great Lino Brocka to Djibril Diop Mambéty, and from Sarah Maldoror (Sambizanga, seen at the Center Pompidou in the presence of Annouchka de Andrade; as someone put it: “How can one avenge all the pain of the film?”) to Héctor Babenco, so many revelatory and promising names I was unfamiliar with have made me shake my cinephile map (both geographically and in terms of values) from its very foundations. In recent years, Scorsese has taken the step towards becoming a complete cinema being: he has turned into a passeur. (Victor Morozov)

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Taxi Driver (1976)

Inevitably, as a cinephile, you become attached to Scorsese as a father figure. I had a teenage crush on Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver: I’d seen the film so many times I could reproduce passages from the script; the mere memory now evokes a deep nostalgia. Of course, I’m among those who binged his filmography, but now I’m more haunted by the thought that he could have directed Scarface; he wanted to direct it, but he couldn’t persuade the producers with his plan of action. Upon its release, Scorsese declared himself a fan of the film, but also anticipated the negative criticism that was to come, especially from Hollywood. Probably, through Scorsese’s lens, it would have been an equally violent version, but less clichéd in its portrayal of Cuban immigrants. (Ramona Aristide)

Redacție

An article written by the magazine's team