Is Martin Scorsese Right About Marvel Movies?

   Martin Charles Scorsese. Accomplished filmmaker, beloved director of films like Taxi Drive and Cape Fear, and now shit-stirrer and trash-talker of superhero films. In the past couple of weeks Martin Scorsese has been in the news lately and no he isn’t making another gangster movie. He has some polarizing remarks in regards to comic book movies, more specifically towards Marvel. Scorsese states the following in and interview with Empire Magazine:

“I tried, you know?” Scorsese later added: “But that’s not cinema. Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”

    And just like the cocaine flushing scene in Goodfellas this brought a ton of drama with movie buffs, comic book fans, and even celebs that starred in said film ranging to support to to criticism. From actor Samuel L. Jackson has eloquently stated that “Everybody doesn't like his stuff either," to Director Frances Ford Coppola agreeing with Scorsese in France 24, by calling Marvel movies "despicable", and somehow Iron Man’s Robert Downey Jr. being on the fence, saying:

 “I mean it plays in theaters. I appreciate [Scorsese’s] opinion. I think it’s like anything where we need all of the different perspectives so we can come to center and move on.”

     So, Scorsese’s opinion has set people off and made them more angry than Joe Pesci, but is he right? This has been a debate by movie fans and comic book fans on whether comic book movies are great movies or good enough that they can be considered artistically in the league of movies that considered great works of art like Gone with the Wind or To Kill a Mockingbird. Are comic book movies art or just pure dumb entertainment?
     First of all, despite Scorsese's, and Coppola comment of Marvel movies don't create or evoke emotion they actually do.We felt something when Spider-Man died and Wanda having to kill her love, Vision and the seriousness of Endgame. But despite evoking emotion, there is to more and Scorsese is right on the nose about the quality of films Marvel churns out. There's more to film making than just getting the viewer to feel emotion during the scene and what Scorsese is really talking about is the quality and the artistic approach and input. Believe it or not there are rules or conventions that makes a movie good and what makes it great. When we look into the movie we base a movie on how good it is depending on its three part structure, pacing, action, acting and it’s overall cinematography. Conveying emotion is cool in all (I’m looking at you Avengers for making me cry for killing off Spider-Man), but it’s more than that. These conversations are basically what separates the Chicagos from the Grease 2s. The Goodfellas from the whatever that Eddie Murphy heist film was. You can look at films like A Clockwork Orange, and look at current films like Moonlight and A Star is Born, and then look at Deadpool and Captain Marvel and clearly see there's a big artistic difference in film making and techniques director use between both bodies of work. It's almost night and day on the quality of both type of films. Even going back to the topic on Marvel movies evoking emotion, there are films that do it in clever and brilliant ways and techniques that makes Marvel movie approach to getting the audience to react to thing does feel, well kinda basic. It has to be more than "Oh no Spider-Man is dying on screen, y'all." 
     That being said Scorsese’s remark about Marvel films, and other Superhero movies being an “amusement park” shouldn’t be taken in a bad way or as an insult. Nothing is wrong with amusement parks. They are fun and they are made simply for the sake of entertaining people and for fun. It’s only bad when people who don’t respect or don’t have knowledge of other films, or the craft of film making, yet want to put films, that are not in same league and then pout when told that it’s not in the same league, like when fans got really bothered when Endgame wasn’t nominated for last year’s Academy Awards while, better films were and honestly the other comic book movie, Black Panther, was a much better body of work but that’s another story.
    So, is Martin Scorsese right about Marvel films and basically all superhero films in general? Yeah, but it's not a bad thing. They are in a sense dumb entertainment and nothing is wrong with dumb entertainment, as long as you understand these films for what they are and are entertained. I'm sure Marvel is not even concerned about making art or cinema. Just good enough movies to make billions off of people wanting to see them. What are your thoughts?

Spider-Man: Homecoming: Does It Suck?

     Spider-Man: Homecoming is out this weekend. It is the long awaited introduction of Spider-Man finally being in the Marvel movie universe. It is also the third reboot of Spider-Man being on the big screen as we were treated to the Sam Raimi films and the Amazing Spider-Man films with Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone. Sam Raimi's Spider Man films were pretty much like going down a slide: fun at first but the other few times kinda are boring and the Amazing Spider-Man films were just bad. Third times a charm right? Will Homecoming be crowned king if the summer superhero box office this year or will it wind up not being so amazing like the Amazing Spider-Man films. Does it suck?
     As the title states, Spider-Man Homecoming is and feels very much like a High School movie. It's cool, hip, and fresh than your standard super hero movie. It really does smell like Teen Spirit, in a good way. You can tell that past John Waters inspired this film. They even made it obvious as they showed the Ferris Bueller chase scene while Spider-Man is chasing the bad guys in a van.
     This time around they went the comedic route with Spidey this time around. No standard Uncle Ben death. No Emma Stone dying. We just get jokes and action, with plenty of jokes. It pretty much felt like a PG-13 version of Deadpool, a Deadpool Jr. and that was a good thing. speaking of both film, I like how Marvel is kinda distancing themselves from the cookie cutter superhero films they've done in the past like Civil War and are giving us something new and changing the format of how these iconic characters are being portrayed on screen.
      The breakout star was Tom Holland who did not only a great job playing both Peter Parker and Spider-Man well. You do get the heroic quirkiness of Spider-Man who is just Peter under the mask and is has some good qualities in him as well, along with the quirkiness of being a teen as well.  Holland found a balance that the other actor who donned the red and blue tights couldn't do just well. Tobey Maguire was an amazing Peter Parker, but couldn't nail being Spider-Man quite right and Andrew Garfield who was an Amazing Spider-Man, but wasn't a really believable Peter Parker. Honorable mention to Zendaya who stole the scene she was in as Michelle. Pretty much all the actors involved were good, except the guy who played Flash Thomson who seemed like a more annoying version of early Potter films Dracoy Molfoy than a rival for Peter, or maybe that was the plan? Oh, and I'm not going to spoil anything, but the rumors about her character are true.

Final Verdict
     So, did Spider-Man Homecoming suck? Nope. It was a fun movie all around. Lot's of laughs and action without doing all the superhero movie cliches or not a lot of them to make it seem droll. Also,
      going back to John Holmes metaphor, the movie had a great deal of using the characters and Peter himself in a  way to make the movie in of itself not only be a great teen film, but using the notion of Peter wanting to be an Avenger, but helping others with his powers a great euphemism for growing up. It get's a 3.5. out of 5, unlike Aunt May who's a 10.

Captain America: Civil War vs Batman vs Superman: Who Did It Better?

 
     Captain America: Civil War is out and you know what that means. No, not comic book nerds flexing their comic book knowledge and pages of feuds of Team Captain America or Team Iron Man all over forums and Twitter. Review time! Instead of doing a typical review like I always do I'll do a compare and contrast putting Civil War up against another superhero movie that was similar to it: Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice. Civil War was suppose to be Marvel's answer to Batman vs Superman with the plot being almost identical: Superheroes fighting each other and the world being pissed at them. With both movies having the same story and theme, which one did it better?

     Both movies touched on a similar subject: Should the government keep superheroes in check? In both cases you had issues where superheroes while trying to save the day cause accidents where casualties are taken.

    Civil War only touched on the subject a couple of times. It was talked about a couple of times, but completely took a back seat to fill the movie with more action and Bucky's story.  The whole let's keep the Avengers in check felt more like a ploy or excuse to have everyone fight for the last leg of the movie. It wasn't very coherent as it went to can we trust the Avengers to handle thing properly to a basic story of revenge.
    BvS did a much better job dealing with this issue. It was more of the plot behind the movie. It was better handled as it was a common issue throughout the whole movie. The issue affected almost every character. You got a idea of how it affected Superman, Batman, and the people proposing the idea of if we can trust Superman and should we regulate him.
     Piggybacking off of the topic of story, Civil War's pretty fluid. Aside, again, from the issue of regulating superheroes and just trying to make that issue a catalyst for a revenge story, nothing felt out of place or weird. For the most part the plot was woven well compared to BvS where its director, Zack Snyder, was for the most part tried to fit concepts in that weren't executed as well. Especially using the movie as the introduction to a vast DC universe, where Civil War and Marvel did exactly right (no shock).      
     The introductions of new characters, Spider-Man and Black Panther and old ones like Ant-Man were done well, especially how the introduced Spider-Man without the long origin story, at least not yet. BvS didn't do that well as they just did a "five minute oh, here are the guys we're putting in the next Justice League movie at around the end of the movie, fun times lol?"
     So who did it better? Civil War was a cookie cutter superhero movie and there is nothing wrong with that as a lot of them are good and they know what the fans want. A lot of action, testosterone, and a little bit of comedy in the mix. I do respect BvS more as it was trying to be a bit different.  It didn't work out like Snyder hoped it did, but I can see what he tried to do. It probably was trying to be the Manturian Candidate of superhero films. I did like the fact that BvS had a theme of can we really trust these superheroes and it kept if throughout most of them movie, which Civil War didn't really do that much of and it got messy a bit.


What are your thoughts?