Martin Scorsese is a living legend in the history of cinema. The 77-year-old filmmaker has great filmography. In this article we talk about his latest feature film: The Irishman.
Large-scale films of a very diverse nature, and decades of activity. Scorsese has released a number of well-known and acclaimed titles such as: Taxi Driver: Taxi Driver (1976), The Good Companions (1990), The Departed (2006). ), Cabo do Fear (1991), Casino (1995), O Lobo de Wall Street (2013) and other highly controversial ones, such as The Last Temptation of Christ (1988).
- Recently.
- His harsh criticism of superhero films has appeared in the news that coexisted with the applause he received for his latest feature film: The Irishman (2019).
- A film with which Scorsese explores a well-known story: that of the bandits.
- The Italian.
- -The American Mafia and the United States in the mid-20th century.
- However.
- Age and the passage of time have given the filmmaker a new perspective.
- A new twist.
Irish is a profession in which Scorsese is “in his comfort zone”. He plays at home, so to speak. He has a cast of veteran actors who, like him, prove they’re still in good shape.
Joe Pesci, Al Pacino and Robert De Niro end up bringing to life a film that, although on a streaming platform like Netflix, reminds us a lot of the past.
Irish is a journey into the past in the strict sense of the word, it is a historical past that goes back specifically to the distant twentieth century, but it is also a journey into the past in a less literal sense, as it is one of the longest films of recent decades.
We live in a time when cinema is partially overshadowed by series. Marathon, one more series than going to the movies. A cinema in which, moreover, there are not many titles that exceed two hours.
The new generations have grown differently; they no longer need to go to the movies when they want to watch a movie, they can pause it to go to the bathroom whenever they want and watch it for more than a day. Pure entertainment is at everyone’s service, and while sometimes offering us unforgettable degrees, it seems to have become something beyond art, relegating it to high school.
Scorsese had a project in mind, but no Hollywood producer accepted it, so he had no choice but to adapt to the new demands of the market: streaming platforms.
Netflix decided to advance the project, a project that can be considered the?Minus Netflix? In the world, but yet it finds its best form of broadcast on the platform, more, on Netflix everything is fine, from authentic jewels to the equivalent of fast food in the audiovisual world, so a paradox is produced.
The film, which evokes the old gangster films, which goes back to the last century and comes from several men who have aged, but with a creativity still in its heyday, ends up being revealed in the most current and reproduced medium. on small devices away from large cinema screens.
However, Scorsese strongly recommends that we do not watch the film on a smartphone, but that we enjoy it on the largest possible screen, on an afternoon when we have nothing to do and without the phone interrupting us.
In short, he proposes to go back in time, to that time when going to the cinema was a pleasant activity.
The Mafia, especially the Italian-American, has starred in some of the greatest film stories: films that have been re-evaluated over time as Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984), to titles known as The Godfather (Coppola, 1972).
Scorsese already dabbed in the genre with Caminhos Perigososos (1973), which was his first collaboration with De Niro, Cassino (1995) and Um dos Nosso (1990).
Scorsese and the protagonists of The Irish belong to a generation born in the 1940s, specifically in New York, with the exception of Pesci, a native of New Jersey, all Italian-American and some even grew up in the Little Italy neighborhood.
Scorsese has always been deeply rooted in his legacy, as shown in the documentary Italianamerican (1974). Today, many years later, it goes back to its origins, to stories that, although real, seem drawn from the purest fiction.
The Irishman explores a real character and delys into the story: from the exaltation and subsequent assassination of Kennedy to the mysterious disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa, the union leader who gave so much to speak in the mid-20th century, and behind all this is a background, a bond led by the interests of the Mafia whose Irish protagonist is a collaborator in charge of “painting the walls”.
Blood-stained walls, clean, quick deaths as a car waits outside a restaurant to take its sicario to safety. Weapons drowned in the water, silenced by the creator of the fastest deaths Scorsese has brought us.
Is it very Scorsese ?, it is an audiovisual exhibition of what cinema, as art, can become through a sublime staging.
Not without giving up black humor and risky conversations that are already “home money,” this is the slowest of his films. Full of blasphemy, but relaxed, mature and away from the dizzying rhythm of The Good Companions or newest films like The Wolf on Wall Street.
The film tells the story of Frank Sheeran, a real character accused of being involved in the Mafia, the story of Hoffa’s disappearance and, finally, the silent history of the 20th-century United States, but in addition to being a gangster story, Scorsese has matured and his maturity is reflected in his characters and the way he tells , through flashbacks, a personal story.
A story of power, of tough guys, who, in the end, are nothing more than gentlemen who have diseases playing pétanque in the yard of a prison.
A film starring the big names of the genre, by Joe Pesci who, despite his retirement, reluctantly accepted a role in which he dazzles; de De Niro, whom we all associate with the Mafia; and Pacino, who, although not working with Scorsese, continues to evoke the glory of the Godfather.
I bet that in a few years we will continue to remember the film and perhaps even be reassessed, if there is one thing the film can be criticized for is the use of new technologies to rejuvenate actors who, from far from the need to prove their immortality, must benefit from their experience.
The use of digital rejuvenation has been heavily criticized, perhaps it would be better to hire young actors for flashbacks, or perhaps reduce their duration. We see De Niro without wrinkles, but his body and movements seem to tell us otherwise.
The film assumes a kind of fusion between the old and the new, the old for its essence, for the maturity of its creator and their faces, but what is new in its dissemination and production.
With 10 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director, The Irishman leaves no one indifferent. Whether because of its breadth, the incredible way of directing our gaze or the rare female presence; something that already appears to be a trademark of the house.
Female roles are residual in almost all of her films; a filmography in which the “hard” predominates.
However, far from criticizing him, in the case of The Irishman, we recognize a time, long ago, in which women were only the decoration of their husbands, yet there is a female character who stands out throughout the film: the daughter of the protagonist who, from the beginning, shows some disgust for her father’s activities.
Quietly, but crudely, he finally gained importance in the latter part, when Sheeran is older, his friends and wife are dead and he only has his daughters, all women, though they seem determined to keep their distance. his father.
Scorsese is a great narrator, able to express the ineffable in words with images; able to represent and capture through your camera what is dormant in each character.
Despite its duration, it manages to conquer us, keeping us connected to the screen to find out how the life of our protagonist ends, a man trapped in a web from which he will not be able to escape.
The Irishman offers us a tour of different stages of life, an introspective journey of a character linked to his past, but who, like every human being, is doomed to die, the reflection of his actions manifests himself in his solitary old age and in an ajar door that leaves the viewer reflecting, in an almost cathartic state that does not rather identify.
Have we seen a simple gangster movie, do we see a journey into the human being, why a door ajar?The future, the death, the destiny, perhaps, are no more: an ajar door.
Netflix main image.