Martin Scorsese On The “Fight Back” Against Comic Book Movie Culture – Deadline

Martin Scorsese is doing the press rounds for his forthcoming Killers of the Flower Moon, and during a recent feature article, he was once again quizzed on his opinions about comic book films. 

 “The danger there is what it’s doing to our culture,” Scorsese said of comic book films during a GQ interview. “Because there are going to be generations now that think movies are only those—that’s what movies are.”

The Taxi Driver filmmaker continued to add that as a result, it is down to contemporary filmmakers to “fight back stronger” to maintain a more robust film culture. 

“It’s gotta come from the filmmakers themselves. And you’ll have, you know, the Safdie brothers, and you’ll have Chris Nolan, you know what I mean? And hit ’em from all sides,” he said. “Hit ’em from all sides, and don’t give up. Let’s see what you got. Go out there and do it. Go reinvent. Don’t complain about it. But it’s true because we’ve got to save cinema.” 

Scorsese added that comic book movies, which he described as “the manufactured content,” aren’t “really cinema.”

He added: “No, I don’t want to say it. But what I mean is that it’s manufactured content. It’s almost like AI making a film. And that doesn’t mean that you don’t have incredible directors and special effects people doing beautiful artwork. But what does it mean? What do these films, what will it give you? Aside from a kind of consummation of something and then eliminating it from your mind, your whole body, you know? So what is it giving you?”

Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, and Lily Gladstone is set for a global October 20 release.

The film, adapted from David Grann’s bestseller by Scorsese and Eric Roth and based on a true story, is set in Oklahoma in the 1920s when oil brought a fortune to the Osage Nation, who became some of the richest people in the world overnight. The wealth immediately attracted white interlopers, who manipulated, extorted, and stole as much Osage money as they could before resorting to murder.

Apple is teaming with Paramount for the global launch, after opting last month that it was best to bypass its original platform-release plan and go all-in on a worldwide release. It will eventually land on Apple TV+.

Martin Scorsese, Dan Friedkin, Bradley Thomas and Daniel Lupi are producers on the pic from Apple Studios, Imperative Entertainment, Sikelia Productions and Appian Way. DiCaprio, Rick Yorn, Adam Sommer, Marianne Bower, Lisa Frechette, John Atwood, Shea Kammer and Niels Juul are executive producers.