Martin Scorsese on Fellini and the devaluing of movies as "content"
Tuesday, February 16, 2021 at 10:00PM 
If you want your love for cinema reenergized you'll want to head to Harpers to read Martin Scorsese's wonderful essay on Federico Fellini and his 1960s heyday and artistic influence. Though much of the essay is a love letter to cinema and Fellini himself (and I Vitelloni, La Dolce Vita, and 8½ in particular) Scorsese also sticks his neck out again to comment on today's cinematic landscape. He always runs into trouble when he does this because people are so quick to misinterpret or take notions out of context or dismiss artistic concerns as "get off my lawn!" generational warfare. But art is for everyone of all ages and it's important and we should always rise up in its defense. That's not being 'out of touch,' that's simply caring about something deeply!
Take this bit for example, in which he discusses streaming culture and the way it devalues movies as "content" a business term, no longer an artistic one...
Curating isn’t undemocratic or “elitist,” a term that is now used so often that it’s become meaningless. It’s an act of generosity—you’re sharing what you love and what has inspired you. (The best streaming platforms, such as the Criterion Channel and MUBI and traditional outlets such as TCM, are based on curating—they’re actually curated.) Algorithms, by definition, are based on calculations that treat the viewer as a consumer and nothing else.
And this part just filled my heart because it's devastating and true and rejuvenating at the same time. It's one of the reasons this site is still hanging so many years later despite all the ups and downs and financial sacrifice.
Everything has changed—the cinema and the importance it holds in our culture. Of course, it’s hardly surprising that artists such as Godard, Bergman, Kubrick, and Fellini, who once reigned over our great art form like gods, would eventually recede into the shadows with the passing of time. But at this point, we can’t take anything for granted. We can’t depend on the movie business, such as it is, to take care of cinema. In the movie business, which is now the mass visual entertainment business, the emphasis is always on the word “business,” and value is always determined by the amount of money to be made from any given property—in that sense, everything from Sunrise to La Strada to 2001 is now pretty much wrung dry and ready for the “Art Film” swim lane on a streaming platform. Those of us who know the cinema and its history have to share our love and our knowledge with as many people as possible. And we have to make it crystal clear to the current legal owners of these films that they amount to much, much more than mere property to be exploited and then locked away. They are among the greatest treasures of our culture, and they must be treated accordingly.
Amen.
Reader Comments (16)
I hate the idea of films being called content. I hate that. It is an insult to the art form. I may not agree with Scorsese on his views on the MCU but I do love his passion for films and film restoration. He definitely has a love for it that is unparalleled with any filmmaker that I know aside from Quentin Tarantino and Edgar Wright.
I own a bunch of films that are diverse based on my collection so far as I also own things such as a box set of films by Andy Sidaris which no will say is high art but I love those films for what they are. I for some strange reason want to become the Henri Langlois in this small town that I live just a few miles away east from the Atlanta Braves baseball stadium. I would like to be someone that showed people these cool films no matter where they're from or what they are.
The argument of "times are getting worse" sounds very cliché and a little derrotist and pesimistic. I honestly don't think that cinema as an art form is undervalued, I would dare to say that is the opposite thanks that streaming and online services help to discover movies that are not so commercial or even were censored at their time.
What I honestly think that affect to any art form is the perception of the audience who tend to consume it (and sometimes even argument) based on what critics, awards or popularity says.
You don't investigate what art could make me you feel elevated in any way. You just let yourself go by the experience, during and after living it THERE is when you feel you were shaked and when yourself gives the relevance to the art. But is because your curiosity is open to live the experience of art, not because someone else tell you what you "need" to consume
I can see that Scorsese can be viewed by today's standard as slowly becoming a relic, someone who clings to an old-fashioned notion of cinema, or as Michael Feinstein sings in "Whatever Happened to Melody?" Yet I cannot fault him for expressing his love for cinema he grew up with, and loved, and cherished. I am not sure if Godard, Bergman, Kubrick, and Fellini are receding into the shadows with the passage of time. The cult of cinema is not just for academics, film historians and cinephiles, but I for one can attest that the films of these auteur are watched by viewers who are not necessarily coming only from film schools, but those whose thirst for cinema led them to check out the "old" films.
I too love film lineups that are curated because it allows me to understand the curator's taste and by extension, ideologies, possibly identities. Yet I am not against the algorithm that selects and chooses items for you when your browsing history reveal a penchant for this particular film. I think algorithm can be useful even if there is distrust that it is powered by tags and keywords rather than the subjective and random. It is like TFE too to a certain extent. Despite its core of being 'actressexual, It genuinely celebrates film in all permutations, it is passionate, also opinionated but always grounding each article that it is intensely personal; and offers a diverse coverage of film, celebrity, auteur, independent movements, others. Although I only read specific topics I am drawn to, TFE is passionate and citizen-centered film curation at its most imaginative.
I always love to read people's top 10, just because.
Thank you for your financial sacrifice over the years. If not we would never have got the supernova that is Claudio (Boy is going places, don't lose his number!) And the other great members of the team. Plus you've allowed writers to grow and get better, not disposing of them for a slow start. Poor Murtada eould be half the writer and voice without your sticking by him and giving him time to reach his current level. Bravo.
Yes.
"Those of us who know the cinema and its history have to share our love and our knowledge with as many people as possible. And we have to make it crystal clear to the current legal owners of these films that they amount to much, much more than mere property to be exploited and then locked away. They are among the greatest treasures of our culture, and they must be treated accordingly."
Bears quoting and repeating. How ANYONE can twist what Scorsese has said and equate it to "gatekeeping" is... well, actually, par for the course with regards to online discourse, but it's still disheartening.
Look I'm a "films give it all to me" kind of guy. I saw THE LAST PICTURE SHOW a few days ago and TO ALL THE BOYS 3 last night.
Ryan T -- same. And Scorsese is obviously wide ranging in his tastes too. It's just one particular genre that he finds lacking. Big deal! People always want to be so angry at other people for some reason.
I completely agree with Scorsese especially the idea of curating. I love Netflix, but navigating it feels like someone dumped the contents of a drawer on the floor and the user is left to sift through the contents. For some people this is great, but for some people like me it feels like overload. And their algorithm needs more work. Just because I watched the first 15 minutes of "Triple Frontier" does not mean I want to watch other movies like it. Stop recommending them!
The problem is that younger film fans have a very narrow concept of cinema- you see on Instagram were the same few movies are mentioned over and over again and they are all made in this century- cinema is over a hundred years old- and people should look at great films from the past yes even the silent era. I go crazy when some new director who is obviously copying an master is called "visionary" or worse "ground breaking" - personally the last real visionary director was Kubrick- there is nobody working now who has can touch him. Classic films should not be forgotten and they should always be part of the conversation if you really care about cinema as art.
Anyone who calls MCU as the peak of cinema is idiotic.
Scorsese all the way.
I like that Scorcese is standing up for curating. And I have major problems with the streaming services. Amazon Prime is such a racket. You sign up for the monthly charge, only to discover that films that are new or valuable for whatever reason, cost $3.99 up to $19.99. Giant ripoff. Netflix is a mess, as someone else said, throwing everything they can find at you, and deciding that just because you liked a comedy, you're going to want to see every comedy they have. Just junked up is my best description of their website.
Hulu seems a little bit more interested in having worthwhile content, and doesn't hold itself as an arbiter of great taste; willing to show regular sitcoms. And HBOMax is the best, allowing you to dig deep into its treasure trove of shows like The Wire, The Sopranos and Sex and The City.
God Bless, Martin Scorsese. I do believe there is a passionate audience for classic cinema out there, but it's not as big or influtential as we would love to think. We need the protectors, the angels, the guardians of our galaxy.
And even those who love MCU cannot remotely think that it's great cinema. That would be insane.
Last year I wrote, produced and directed a feature film about the same subject.
It's "Le Cineaste - a director's journey".
You can follow it on IMDb or on the official website: www.lecineaste.com
I hope that , thanks to Scorsese, the problem the film industry and film as art is facing is finally brought up.
Jaragon - Don't restrict yourself to English-language cinema - the Dardenne Brothers, Wong Kar-Wai, Andrey Zvyagintsev, Hirokazu Koreeda and various Romanians and Koreans are making original ground-breaking visionary films right now. And as for English-language cinema, Chloe Zhao is off to a pretty strong start, although I just hope she doesn't get sucked up in the Marvel assembly line.
I agree with Amy. There are still many great visionary directors out there. They're just not making Hollywood films: Carlos Reygadas, Ming-liang Tsai, Julián Hernández, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lav Diaz, João Pedro Rodrigues, Roy Andersson... When people complain to me that there are no great directors any more, I mention their, and others', names and usually, I get a half-hearted "well, I meant in Hollywood." I'm not all that sympathetic to those folks. They read text messages on a tiny phone all day, but they won't read subtitles?
Great.