Bringing Out the Dead (Summer of Scorsese)

Sadly, this will be the final "Summer of Scorsese" post. There's just too much going on right now, move-wise and personally. Classes start again for me soon, and my posting frequency might dip off a bit once that hits. I will still post as much I can, particularly new movie reviews, but as far as "Summer of Scorsese" goes I'm afraid this will have to be all. I realize I have skipped over many major films in his career (The Aviator and The Last Temptation of Christ come to mind) but I feel continuing would be ill-advised. My posts for this feature have already been few and far between, and in my opinion declining in quality because they've been forced, so it ends now. Hope you enjoyed, I know I did.

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Unmistakably a product of Martin Scorsese, Bringing Out the Dead plays like the child of Taxi Driver and After Hours in the midst of a drug overdose. As pure visual filmmaking it is a complete triumph, and even though there isn’t one overriding plot I got caught up in the energy and brutal honesty presented through Scorsese’s direction, Nicolas Cage’s certifiably insane performance, and the screenplay by Taxi Driver and Raging Bull writer Paul Schraeder.

Nicolas Cage plays Frank Pierce, a paramedic working nights in New York City, a city presented here as the natural evolution (or devolution) of Schrader’s New York City presented in Taxi Driver from the 70’s to the 90’s. To Frank it is but a maze of misery he is forced to inhabit every night, and when the film begins he hasn’t saved anyone in months. The ghosts of those he has lost haunt him, including Rose, a young girl he could not save. Frank is continually tired, stressed and lonely, and he lives his life of routine despondency until he meets Mary (Patricia Arquette). Frank is able to revive her father from death, and Mary spends a lot of time in the hospital waiting for her father to get better. She provides an example of the naiveté that exists outside Frank’s world. However, Frank is still trapped inside.

Whatever you do, don’t watch this movie expecting a realistic portrait of a New York City paramedic. Schraeder and Scorsese are not much for verisimilitude here, focusing instead on penetrating Frank’s mind and the hallucinations within. At one point fireworks fill the New York skyline for no real reason except to communicate a state of mind. The camera zooms quickly and drastically with energy only Scorsese can muster. This is one of Scorsese’s more surrealist films, and here it works perfectly to match Nicolas Cage’s energy. By midway through the film Cage is about ready to go crazy, and when he loses it he does it in the normal Nicolas Cage way. Sometimes he can come off as abrasive, but I absolutely love his work here.

Over the course of the three days presented in the film Frank works with three different partners. The first is Larry, played by John Goodman. Of the partners Frank will work with he is most aware of the horrors of the job, ending their night throwing his hands in the air and essentially giving up. He represses most of the pain and stress, focusing instead on his next meal. Eventually he explodes. His second partner is Marcus, (Ving Rhames) a devout Christian who attempts to spread his religious beliefs across the city while on the job. While treating an overdose Marcus distracts the crowd by having them praise Jesus, making Frank’s more medical solution seem like a divine miracle. He does not see his job as dehumanizing but instead invigorating and a chance to observe his beloved Lord at work.

Frank’s third partner is Tom (Tom Sizemore, whose career is sadly coming apart), who takes his anxiety and turns it into a violent rage that abuses patients. There is one patient he beats and/or kicks multiple times. He always needs to be hitting something, and the moment he comes apart is seen in the background of a brilliant shot near the end of the film.

Frank himself has been beaten down into a fraction of a human being. To him there is no greater thrill than saving someone’s life, which he describes as “the best drug in the world”. That’s why he became a paramedic, besides the fact that his mother was a nurse and his father was a bus driver. Now that he works the job he has become disillusioned with the lifestyle that was advertised to him as rife with heroes waiting to leap to rescue when called upon. Instead he is surrounded by insanity and death. He’s not there to save people, but instead to sit there and be there for those around the dying. As he puts it, he is merely a “grief mop”.

Bringing Out the Dead is also one of Scorsese’s funnier films, in the darkest way imaginable. It’s even able to slip in a few Monty Python references (look at the title). In a way Frank is that man walking amongst the plagued villagers, asking to collect the bodies. He can’t save them, but he can be there to watch them die. This is an oppressively unbearable job, and the characters whip out defense mechanisms left and right, refusing to submit themselves to the misery. This film is the exact opposite of the glorified medical dramas that exist on TV. It’s not always a glorious job. It’s a grim job, a bloody job, and Scorsese and Cage put themselves right in the middle of it. The universe here might be a little too stark, (I’m sure reality exists somewhere in the middle) but it reaches you and shakes you like few films can.

Amazingly, not many people are on board with me here. Many see Bringing Out the Dead as one of Scorsese’s worst. I could not disagree more. Is there a bit of style over substance? Of course, and this is something that could be (and has been) said about Shutter Island as well. However, I think there’s more meat on the bone here than people give it credit for. It’s intentionally abrasive, showing you a side of life many people refuse to acknowledge. Each character has been disillusioned with their professions, and in a way the film does that to you as well. This is not an optimistic film, but this is not a vice. Scorsese directs every film with equal tenacity and energy, and he sees nothing as a minor project. Bringing Out the Dead is not the best film he's ever done, but it’s still better and more memorable than what most people could pull off when they give everything they’ve got.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
Gangs of New York
Mean Streets
Casino
Raging Bull
Bringing Out the Dead
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Review)

Thanks again! I wish I could have done more, but it's likely I'm not COMPLETELY finished with the work of Martin Scorsese.

Raging Bull (Summer of Scorsese)

Raging Bull is not a boxing movie. It’s a movie about an incredibly troubled man who happens to be a boxer. The same story could be told about a teacher, an accountant or any office drone. The fact that he’s a boxer adds some emotional resonance. A boxing movie would be about the process leading up to The Big Fight which the hero would win. Jake LaMotta, the main character in Raging Bull, is not a hero, and there is no The Big Fight. LaMotta is a man whose paranoia and rage leads him to alienate himself and everyone around him. The movie does not end with rousing music as he stands before an adoring crowd, but instead it ends with an overweight LaMotta about to perform bad stand-up comedy, as he shadowboxes in front of the mirror, perhaps playing this usual clichéd ending in his head.

Scorsese had nearly died of a drug overdose when Robert DeNiro finally came to him in his hospital room. DeNiro had been fascinated with the character of Jake LaMotta, and was trying to convince everyone around him that this was a film worth making. Scorsese finally agreed, seeing as his life could go nowhere but up. And up it went, my friends. Raging Bull is as close to perfect as movies get. In its day it was seen as merely very good, but by the end of the 80’s many critics selected it as the best film of the decade, and to this day many feel it is one of the best movies ever made. It is definitely one of Scorsese’s best films, and since I find Scorsese to be one of the best American directors of all time, by the transitive property it must be so.

There is no real plot to Raging Bull per se, but instead it acts as a character study of an incredibly disturbed man. The opening credits show Robert DeNiro’s Jake LaMotta in an empty boxing ring, the music making it feel more like a ballet than shadowboxing. After beginning with LaMotta practicing his comedy routine, we are thrust into the middle of a fight against Jimmy Reeves. This ends up being LaMotta’s first loss, and a riot ensues. He’s in the middle of a collapsing marriage, but soon he meets a young girl named Vickie. Jake begins to worry that Vickie is not being faithful to him, and after she makes a comment about the attractiveness of one of Jake’s opponents he destroys him in the ring.

Jake’s brother Joey (Joe Pesci) also works as Jake’s manager/agent/whateveryoucallit. He is the only person in the movie willing to stand up to Jake, and the only person Jake cares for. This makes it all the more heartbreaking for Jake when he accuses Joey of sleeping with Vickie. Jake does not use reason when it comes to women. He sees women as beautiful objects, but if the women are willing to sleep with him they must be willing to sleep with other men, at which point they are monsters. Many see Raging Bull as an incredibly accurate portrayal of what causes men to beat their wives, and he vents much of his frustration in the ring.

The performances are perfect all around, but then again so is the film. The most obvious is DeNiro, who at one point put on 70 pounds to portray a post-boxing LaMotta. DeNiro in his best years committed to his roles as no actor ever has. Part after part DeNiro completely immersed himself in the universe and personality of his characters. Just watch him work in Raging Bull for 5 minutes and at no point will it occur to you this is the same guy who did Travis Bickle, the young Vito Corleone, or the dad from Meet the Parents (a film just a notch below Raging Bull). Many actors can adapt to their parts, but few can transform like Robert DeNiro once did.

The film is stuffed to the brim with the usual Scorsesian energy and brilliance. The dialogue comes out of the characters’ mouths with the usual and realistic clumsiness. There are few poetic lines, but many that ring true. Raging Bull was filmed in black and white for several reasons. One was to set the film apart from the color film pack, another was to give it the feel of the period, and the last because of all the blood that would have been onscreen during the fight scenes. Black and white makes it all the more primal, but much less graphic. In these scenes Scorsese never focuses on the audience. We’re not here to be a spectator to the boxing, but to witness the life of LaMotta. The editing by Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese’s longtime collaborator, nearly spins our heads off as if we had just been hit by a right hook.

No words I write on this film can do it justice, which is why you may find it to be one of my less descriptive posts. All I can do is get on my knees and beg you to see this movie. There is so much I could talk about, but instead I will merely end it here. See it, and admire its energy, its passion and its tragedy. Admire DeNiro give another performance the likes of which you may never see again. This is a film that will be around for a long, long time. At least for as long as we have taste.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
Gangs of New York
Mean Streets
Casino
Raging Bull
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Review)

Up next: Bringing Out the Dead

Casino (Summer of Scorsese)

It is directed by Martin Scorsese, with a screenplay by himself and Nicholas Pileggi, all inspired by a nonfiction book by Pileggi. It stars both Robert DeNiro and Joe Pesci, with Pesci as an ill-tempered mobster quick to resort to violence. It chronicles the rise to glory of a group of powerful mobsters, then chronicles their sudden and violent fall from grace.

The movie I’m describing here could be either Goodfellas or Casino, the two mob movies Martin Scorsese made in the early 90’s along with the help of Nicholas Pileggi. For this reason Casino is often jokingly referred to as Goodfellas 2, and deservedly so. They are made in incredibly similar styles. Casino takes the documentary style sometimes used in Goodfellas and runs with it until the legs give out. The similarity is something even Scorsese has acknowledged.

This does not mean Casino can’t stand as its own picture. It can, but to a point. There are moments that are brilliant here and rank up among the most fascinating sequences in any Scorsese film. It is also significantly overlong and has moments where it bogs down to a near-screeching halt. It’s still a blast to watch, however, and for me it has a sense of beauty to it that many Scorsese films don’t have. It captures the culture of the Las Vegas strip in all its sinful glory. The bright lights surround the characters, and eventually blind them.

Sam “Ace” Rothstein (Robert DeNiro) works for the mob as a sports handicapper, able to pick winners for just about every sporting event thrown his way. Since he is a natural winner, the mob chooses him to run the fictional Tangiers casino in Las Vegas. The audience is then treated to an incredible documentary-esque sequence where we learn the inner workings of the casino. We all knew the mob skimmed off the top, but this film knows every step of the process. We follow the money all the way from the money room in the casino to the nameless city of “back home”.

Casino is best with details, something Scorsese has obsessed over in his mob movies. It’s based on real events, with the “Ace” character based on the real-life Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal. Every character is based on a real person, including Joe Pesci’s Nicky Santoro, based on Tony Spilotro, and Sharon Stone’s Ginger Rothstein, based on Geraldine Rosenthal. When Nicky moves down to Las Vegas to protect Ace, we are taken through a series of events that leads to tragedy. It all begins with one moment.

Ace watches from the security cameras, and at a table he sees a woman. To anybody else this is just another woman. Not to Ace. He falls in love at that very instant, and from that point on they are all doomed. This woman is Ginger, and though she does not love him back, for her this is her best opportunity to marry into money. A whole lot of money, as well. She becomes so greedy that she steals from everyone, doing what she can just to get ahead.

However, it is this love story where Casino does not work as well. I find Sharon Stone’s performance to be effective, but also overrated. She spends the film’s three-hour length repeating the same “I love you Sam, I don’t love you Sam!” notes with the appropriate profanity, but it grows tiring after a while. This may not be entirely her fault (it’s what the material calls for), but the Academy Award nomination she got was not necessarily earned.

Unlike Goodfellas, when the characters worked so well, here whenever the film tries to let us in it comes off as unnecessary and it slows the film down considerably. The script, if not the film itself, could have used some significant trimming. The documentary-type scenes are brilliant, but the love story and the deeper character moments don’t always ring true. This is a bit surprising to me, for Scorsese-penned scripts have often been focused on the qualities of characters first and foremost (Mean Streets, GoodFellas). I think the problem here is that instead of telling the big picture through a small group of people, Scorsese is trying to tell the big picture WHILE focusing on a small group of people. You can’t always have your cake and eat it too, and when you try to juggle this many balls you're bound to drop a few.

News flash: Martin Scorsese often makes violent films. However, Casino takes it to a level that is almost unnecessary. A man’s head is put in a vise, a hand is smashed with a hammer, people are shot to death (men and women), and many other tools are used as murder weapons, including a pen, and the scene in which baseball bats are used is one of the hardest scenes to watch in a gangster film. Usually Scorsese shoots violence in an abrupt and shocking way, but in Casino he makes it linger a little too long, and it stops being effective and becomes disgusting.

Casino is not Martin Scorsese’s best film, but it is certainly not his worst. It is overlong, to be sure, but in that time we get scenes that are captivating, some that are effective on an emotional level, but also some that drag on. We see the best and worst of Scorsese in this film, and that alone makes it worth checking out. It shows us people that were given heaven on Earth (which the cinematography captures perfectly), but it the end, as Nicky says himself, “we f----d it all up”.

P.S.- The use of narration here is unique in that it betrays an audience assumption about narration. You’ll see what I mean.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
Gangs of New York
Mean Streets
Casino
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Review)

Up next: Raging Bull

Mean Streets (Summer of Scorsese)

Martin Scorsese’s first film was Who’s That Knocking at My Door?, and it was released in 1967. It began as a student short film, grew to feature length, and after a sex scene was shoehorned in for commercial purposes, the final product was born. Not many people have seen it, but many who have claim it shows a director of incredible promise, and it focuses on a protagonist named J.R. (played by Harvey Keitel) who wrestles with his Catholic guilt. Scorsese’s career was finally launched, and he went on to make the exploitation film Boxcar Bertha for producer Roger Corman.

After that excursion he delved back to his roots and updated the themes of Who’s That Knocking at My Door? and came out with Mean Streets, and suddenly one of America’s greatest filmmakers was born. The J.R. character from Who’s That Knocking becomes Charlie, a young man in Little Italy who aspires to rise up in the Mafia, all while carrying on a relationship with an epileptic girl Teresa, struggling with Catholicism, and looking after Teresa’s cousin Johnny Boy.

Charlie is played by Harvey Keitel, then a complete unknown, and he performs incredibly well here. The character faces a laundry list of internal conflicts throughout the film, and it is clear that these are many conflicts Scorsese himself faced in his young life. The opening narration is by Scorsese himself:

“You don't make up for your sins in church. You do it in the streets. You do it at home. The rest is bulls**t and you know it.”

The four main characters are introduced off the bat, and their first moments onscreen are brilliant in that they tell us most of what we need to know within seconds. Tony (David Proval) owns a bar, and he knows most of the people that come in, the good and the bad. Michael (Richard Romanus) provides various goods (such as cigarettes) to his friends so long as he is paid back. Johnny Boy (Robert DeNiro) is hot-tempered and owes money to just about everyone including Michael. Our first shot of Johnny Boy shows him blowing up a mailbox.

Last but not least, our hero Charlie, played by Harvey Keitel. He is in a church. A candle burns nearby. He takes his finger and attempts to hold it above the flame, but is unable. This is a feat he will attempt throughout the film. To his friends he claims it is just a magic trick he’s trying. To Charlie it cuts to his very core. Charlie is afraid of going to hell, but he knows he is not a righteous person. He imagines hell as that feeling of the flame against the flesh, only “a million times” more intense. Early on he explains:

“The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart... your soul, the spiritual side. And you know... the worst of the two is the spiritual.”

Within minutes Charlie leaves the church and goes to his friend Tony’s bar. There is a red glow throughout. Topless women dance onstage. Herein lies the hypocrisy of Charlie’s being. He wants to be a devout Catholic, tells people he is, but he routinely goes to this hotbed of alcohol and sin. He carries on a sexual relationship with Teresa, Jonny Boy’s cousin, but has no intention of marrying her. She tells him he loves him, but he refuses to respond. He tells her he doesn’t, and at one point simply responds “Don’t say that”. Charlie’s common response to everyone is “What’s the matter with you?” in a lovely Italian-American accent. He never once realizes that the problem might be himself.

This film marks the beginning of Robert DeNiro’s string of masterful performances. When Mean Streets was released he was nobody, but his dazzling performance as Johnny Boy gained everyone’s attention quickly. He won an Oscar for his next role as a young Vito Corleone in The Godfather: Part Two. After that was Taxi Driver. Robert DeNiro did not act in these days, he transformed. In no two consecutive films did he even look like the same man. Compare this to the DeNiro we see today, who at times appears to be acting between naps. I don’t think we’ve seen a truly inspired Robert DeNiro performance since Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown, unless you count The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle.



It is clear the dilemmas faced by Charlie in Mean Streets reflect certain situations Scorsese himself face back in his younger days. Charlie is attracted to a dancer at Tony’s bar, but she’s black. He eventually attempts to take her on a date, but he chickens out. What if he’s seen?

Scorsese has had a gift for capturing realistic violence onscreen throughout his entire career, and here is where it all begins. Scorsese does not linger on violent acts. They happen quickly, we’re all surprised, but life goes on. The fights here are not clean and pretty, but clumsy. A crucial bar fight is shot with various longer shots, and the characters are not fighting with any real precision. In many cases the characters are trying to run away. The violence here is not as brutal as it would become in later Scorsese films, but the basic idea is here to be seen.

In the end nothing Charlie does is good enough for anybody. He wants to open his own restaurant under the protection of the mafia, but they tell him not to associate with Jonny Boy or Teresa. To Michael he acts as the middle man for Jonny Boy, trying to reassure that all debts will be paid. Nothing he does can please himself or those above him, including the mob, his friends, his girlfriend, or the big guy, God. After the car crash at the end Charlie looks at the sky, as if he is asking “What can I do?”. Mean Streets came on to the film scene with a bang in 1973 and everyone took notice. This kid Scorsese means business.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
Gangs of New York
Mean Streets
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Review)

Up next: Casino

Gangs of New York (Summer of Scorsese)

After revisiting Gangs of New York I was surprised to find I did not have the same enthusiasm for the film I had after the initial viewing. Don’t get me wrong, I think it is a good film, but I had many issues with what was done on a story level. The production design is nearly flawless, and many of the performances are quite good, including an absolute tour-de-force from Daniel Day-Lewis, but it didn’t all click for me, and most of my problems lie in the second half.

Gangs of New York claims to tell a lost chapter in American history, the history of the Five Points in New York City. The Five Points were located in what is now Manhattan, and back in the mid-1800’s it was ruled by various gangs. Poverty ravaged the area, and any immigrants getting off the boats are met with brutality. The country is in the midst of the Civil War, a war many citizens of the Five Points don’t believe should be fought.

The film begins with a battle between the Irish immigrants, led by Priest Vallon (Liam Neeson), and the so-called American “natives”, led Bill “The Butcher” Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis). The fight is one of the more brutal battle sequences captured on film, and Scorsese does something here similar to what Steven Spielberg did with Saving Private Ryan. The camera, and thus the audience, stays in the midst of the action instead of pulling away, putting us in the middle of the violence. It is not a pleasant sequence to watch, and we know right away that we are not dealing with normal men. These are savages.

Priest Vallon is killed by the Butcher, leaving Vallon’s son Amsterdam orphaned. We flash forward to Amsterdam (Leonardo DiCaprio) in adulthood, and he vows revenge against the Butcher as most movie characters do. In my opinion this is the plotline that works best here. Amsterdam returns to Five Points and through his fellow Irish friends gets close inside the Butcher’s circle. Instead of going straight for the kill, Amsterdam starts to get a little too comfortable with being so powerful. This is an idea Scorsese has expressed in many of his works, particularly the gangster movies, and it does not come off as wholly original. That does not mean it doesn’t work, because if you’re good at something you never stop being good at it, and thus I quite enjoyed this plotline the most.

What doesn’t work quite as well is when the film tries to shoehorn in some actual history. While the character of Bill Cutting is based on an actual man, the story involving Amsterdam and his revenge seems entirely fictional. In the second half the film tries to incorporate the New York draft riots of 1863, and it does not do so gracefully. I truly believe a great, separate movie could be made about the riots, but it doesn’t work here. Because the riots are introduced, the climax of the movie is interrupted and it ends with more of a whimper than a bang.

Leonardo DiCaprio is a good actor who is able to perform most every job asked of him rather impressively, even if he is never truly great. The actor here who is always truly great is Daniel Day-Lewis as Bill the Butcher. He had not done a film since 1997 when he was approached for this film, and here he gives a great performance. This might be a warm-up for his eventual work in There Will be Blood, in which he gives us the best performance in recent memory, but here he exudes an acting ability the likes of which the world rarely sees.

Cameron Diaz I never quite buy in a role like the one she has here. She’s a pleasant enough screen presence, but as a serious actress I have yet to be sold. There’s solid work here from everyone else as well, including stints from Brendan Gleeson and John C. Reilly.

There is a moment towards the end where Amsterdam finally decides what he is going to do about the Butcher situation, and when he acts on it the sequence is terric, most of the credit going to Day-Lewis. However, from that point on the film slogs down quite a bit, feeling the need to be much more methodical than is required. I grew bored with it a little bit, but I thought we had a slam-bang climax to look forward to. I was wrong. Instead we get the draft riots and a bit of an anticlimax.

The final shot, which is impressive, tries to sell to us that what we have just seen single-handedly built the city of New York as we know it. While it altered the future, I don’t think it’s as important a chapter in American history as the film thinks it is. Someone could explain to me why I’m wrong, and I would listen, but at the moment it seems more unpleasant than critical. Not to mention there isn’t a bunch of originality at work here. The acting, set design and most of the special effects all work quite well, but at the end of the day Gangs of New York seems to be one of Scorsese’s more minor efforts.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
Gangs of New York
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Review)

Up next: Mean Streets

After Hours (Summer of Scorsese)

In 1985 Martin Scorsese was already an incredibly established filmmaker. He had made Mean Streets, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull already, amongst other things. He had begun work on a film he had wanted to make since the beginning: The Last Temptation of Christ (Not to be confused with The Last Airbender). Everything appeared in place, but at the last second the entire project was scrapped by Paramount. Scorsese said of the aftermath: “My idea then was to pull back, and not to become hysterical and try to kill people. So the trick then was to try and do something.”

Thus we are given After Hours, a movie which seems out of place on the Scorsese filmography. He was not involved with the project from its inception (three days!), and it seems small in every way. Usually Scorsese films have higher ambitions than the story of a strange night in the life of word processor Paul Hackett, but here Scorsese is directing this small little film. In the process he makes it seem more important than it really is, and one of the more interesting films in Scorsese’s body of work if not the best (and it certainly isn’t). After Hours feels more like the promising debut of a young director than the project of one more experienced.

The screenplay was written by Joseph Minion, at the time a film student at Columbia University. Originally intended to be an early feature for Tim Burton, Scorsese was given the script by actress Amy Robinson, who had previously worked with Scorsese in Mean Streets. Scorsese became interested, and saw the film as an opportunity to vent his frustrations over the cancellation of Last Temptation. Burton stepped aside, and thus began the project.

Griffin Dunne, who also produced the film with Robinson, stars as Paul Hackett, a man who leads an exceedingly normal existence. While reading in a café he meets a girl named Marcy. He becomes romantically intrigued and later that night he calls her up and heads over to her apartment. This is just the first step in a night that would soon spiral out of control.

After Hours is strange in the way it seems to be resistant to true criticism. The events happen, one after another, and we believe all of them. The characters are believable in the way that they seem rooted in reality, despite the chaos around them. However, I remain amazed at just how small it all is, and that is the only thing I feel one can pick apart about the film. The only ambition is to show what happens, and then move on. Scorsese directs with his usual energy and draws you in to the story, but at the end of the day the usual substance one expects from a Scorsese film is not there. It doesn’t leave one empty, per se, but if anyone asked me if they absolutely needed to see After Hours I might say no. But that may not even be true, because of its importance in Scorsese’s career.

The characters here are all wonderfully strange as a counterpoint to Paul, our “straight man”. Marcy, it turns out, is a much weirder girl than is originally suspected, but that is nothing compared to her roommate Kiki, who creates paper mâché sculptures in the living room and is apparently in to sadomasochism. Marcy is married, and has another boyfriend already besides Paul. Paul decides to leave the apartment, appropriately freaked out, and the night goes further downhill from there. He meets a few other women, all encounters ending badly. A rumor spreads that Paul is the burglar who has been running wild around town, and a large angry mob begins following him. There is a suicide, a couple of strange painters played by Cheech and Chong, a bartender played by John Heard, and a few adventures in Club Berlin, a place Paul decidedly does NOT belong.

To go to deep into plot synopsis would be to spoil the fun for those who have not seen it, and there is a whole lot of fun to be had in After Hours. Scorsese was able to go on and make The Last Temptation of Christ later on, but I think After Hours holds a special place in his heart. It represents one of his few adventures into the world of comedy, coming right after The King of Comedy, which is hardly a laugh-out-loud film. Neither is this, but I feel this film works better within the definition of comedy, but it is incredibly dark.

As a dark comedy it is probably incredibly influential. Various indie comedies and indie films in general probably owe a lot to this film. On top of all that After Hours stands as one of the more original in the bunch, including an attempt at making the same basic plot more hip and happening in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. To any other filmmaker this film would be a breakthrough, but when comparing it to the rest of Scorsese’s work it comes off as strange and small. Then why is it so darn entertaining?

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver
After Hours
The Departed (My Favorite Movies)
Shutter Island (Original Review)

Up next: Gangs of New York

Taxi Driver (Summer of Scorsese)

Robert DeNiro’s performance as Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver is the kind of work you don’t see anymore. Or ever, for that matter. Here is a case of total immersion into a role that even though Travis Bickle may resemble Robert DeNiro, in no way is DeNiro even seen in this film’s 113 minute running time. This performance, along with Martin Scorsese’s brilliant direction, makes Taxi Driver one of the most memorable films one will ever see. It is not a wholly joyous experience, in fact it is incredibly disturbing, but it is an important film that everybody who can stomach it should see. This is the film that firmly planted Martin Scorsese among the best American filmmakers.

Taxi Driver captures its time and place to a tee, that being New York City in the 1970’s. Bickle is a cabbie who drives through the streets, always watching. Even in conversations, Bickle does not participate, but he only observes. He sits, quietly judging all around him. Bickle is the only pure thing in the city, the way he sees it. Everyone else is scum, and in his own words, “Someday a real rain will come and wash all the scum off the streets.” He is as lonely as any person I have seen, fictional or otherwise. He knows this, even though he won’t admit it. He so desperately needs a woman but he cannot have one. Yet around him everybody else seems to get them at will. Pimps, porn stars, and prostitutes rule the streets. Sex is everywhere, but he can have none of it. Steam comes from the sewers as he drives through Times Square. New York City is not so much a city as it is a frying pan, and there must be some kind of fire beneath it.

The most famous scene in the movie involves Travis looking at himself in the mirror, gun in holster. He stares, then utters the infamous words: “You talkin’ to me? I’m the only one here.” He is not only the only one in the room, but he is the only person in his life. He tries his hardest to form friendships with others, but he is always misguided. There are two women he meets over the course of the film; the first is Betsy, played by Cybill Shepherd. She works in the presidential campaign office for Senator Palantine. Travis comes in pretending to be interested, but he knows nothing about policy. He just wants to go out with her. She finds Travis interesting, and she accepts. After agreeing to a second date, Travis takes her to an adult movie. He knows no other movies, and he doesn’t expect the negative reaction he receives. Betsy never sees him again. She then no longer becomes an idol for Travis. He says: “I realize now how much she's just like the others, cold and distant, and many people are like that, women for sure, they're like a union.” Women are the problem, not him. He sees nothing wrong with taking a woman to a porn film.

The second woman is not a woman so much as a girl. Her name is Iris, and she is a 12-year-old prostitute played by Jodie Foster in a disturbingly convincing performance. She works for the pimp named Sport, played by Harvey Keitel. Sport is the embodiment of everything Travis detests in the world. He fancies himself the liberator of Iris. He wants her to be free and go home, and have the life he never did. Iris is reluctant, there is no life for her elsewhere. She likes it just fine as a prostitute. Foster is great here, and these are the kind of roles child actors need to take these days to move into more adult roles. Making The Last Song several times will not make Miley Cyrus a good actress. In 1976 Jodie Foster is here playing a young prostitute, and to this day she remains incredibly reliable.

Scorsese allows no one else’s thoughts to enter the film except Travis. We see all through his eyes. Travis is a racist man, whenever there are black characters onscreen we see them as Travis does. Several pimps in a restaurant, the camera gazes upon them as animals. They are all watching Travis, or so Travis thinks. His fellow taxi drivers all try to reach him, but he puts a wall up around himself. They must repeat their questions. He gazes into a glass of water, losing himself in his twisted mind. The first time Betsy appears she is in slow motion, as Travis undoubtedly sees her.

Travis not only wants to liberate Iris from Sport, but after Betsy turns him down he sees her as a slave to Palantine. Travis seeks to set her free, and he plans to assassinate Palantine.

SPOILERS AHEAD, BUT THEY DON’T RUIN THE EXPERIENCE NECESSARILY

Travis is unable to kill Palantine, so now there is only one option: free Iris. As Travis runs in shooting everything that moves, the viewer experiences one of the most intense and disturbingly violent scenes on film. It is quick, but it ingrains itself in the mind of all that watch it. We have followed Travis through his trials in one of the great character studies of all time, and that adds to the impact. This is not violence for violence’s sake, but it is instead the only course of action Travis saw fit. He has descended into hell to clean it out, and after the shooting we see blood all over the walls, with bodies strewn about. If this is not hell, I do not know what is. It is up to the viewer whether Travis has fulfilled his mission, or instead if he is part of the scum he hates so vehemently.

The ending is much debated amongst film scholars. Travis has apparently become a hero to the community, and he survives to continue his work. He meets Betsy again in the back of his cab. He seems almost calm. One may ask themselves how the film we have just watched could end on such a positive note. It puzzles some viewers almost so much that they believe it is a dream for Bickle, and that he actually died in the shooting. Maybe this is true, and maybe he is seen as a hero. Only a man so twisted could do such an act. What the ending does provide is closure inside Travis’s mind, whether it is literal or not. However, this is hardly the “happily ever after” ending many think it is. The final shot is of Travis looking in his rear view mirror. Did he see something? Who knows? What we do know is that this man’s mind is anything but stable, and he is more than capable of starting all over again.

Summer of Scorsese
Original Post
Goodfellas
Taxi Driver

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Goodfellas (Summer of Scorsese)

It all begins with the narration: “As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.” Middle class white boys like me may never understand this sentiment, but to a kid living in the midst of Brooklyn with strict parents, there is nothing more attractive. Henry Hill watches out of his bedroom window as all the “wiseguys” sit around and play cards all night. These guys don’t have to ask for anything, they just get it.

However, when we hear Hill narrate this opening line, we have not been warmly welcomed into the film. Driving down a road he, Tommy DeVito and Jimmy Conway hear a bump in the trunk. It is revealed there lays a man, barely alive. Tommy and Jimmy finish the job in brutal fashion. We then begin the flashback, wondering how a man can find such a lifestyle appealing. As a child Henry drops out of school to work for the local gangsters. He knows this is the only way to make a name for himself around town, and he works his way up the ladder much to the dismay of his parents.

After being arrested the first time, he is given the advice that would come to shape the rest of his life, courtesy of Jimmy (Robert DeNiro): “Never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut.” No matter what happened, this is the code he is to follow. We are then taken to Henry’s adulthood and we observe how his lavish lifestyle soon begins to dissolve into something much less glamorous.

This is the definitive mob movie. The Godfather is a terrific film to be sure, but there is barely an inch of truth to it. That is a romanticized mob, for the truth is the mob does not sit around speaking Italian at each other in their mansions. Real mobsters don’t have mansions. They have a lot of money, to be sure, but they tend not to look it. Business is done in back rooms, poor lighting and all. They sometimes dress well, but they don’t waltz around in tuxes all day. This is the most powerful man in the Goodfellas universe:



Certainly no Vito Corleone there, but I feel I might have done both films a disservice by comparing them, as these are two films that probably should not be compared. It does not matter whether or not a movie is about mobsters, but the question is why is a movie about mobsters? In that case comparing The Godfather to Goodfellas is apples and oranges.

The genius of Goodfellas is in the details, something Scorsese has been all about from the beginning. As recently as The Departed it was reported that in his mind Scorsese debated how much Leonardo DiCaprio’s Billy Costigan should receive from the Massachusetts police to go undercover. He needed to know the amount of money, but at no point in the film is it revealed to the audience. In Scorsese’s mind everything needs to be accounted for. Goodfellas, along with Casino, shows Scorsese completely immersed in the world he creates. At one point Ray Liotta’s Henry Hill is sent to jail, and in this sequence the life therein is described to us in detail, down to what goes into the sauce they eat every night.

For the first half of the film life is going swimmingly for Hill, all of it encompassed in one extended shot. Let’s watch:



The Copacabana was a symbol of luxury for New York City residents back in the 70’s, one of them being Martin Scorsese. In fact, at the beginning when we watch the young Henry Hill looking out his window in awe of the local gangsters it is hard not to see that as a young Scorsese. Perhaps Goodfellas is a depiction of an alternate life for Scorsese, had he not had asthma and was forced to sit inside all day. Instead of going outside, he would go see movies with his dad. It was the only activity he could do. As he grew older he would watch many of his friends get involved with the mob.

The Copacabana shot beings outside on the street, and every door on the way in is opened for Henry Hill. He is respected by everyone he sees. He meets many of his fellow mobsters inside. By getting involved he is able to get help with anything he needs, including impressing a girl, in this case Karen (Lorraine Bracco) who becomes his wife. This shot could also be seen from her point of view, as seen at the end, when she asks exactly what he does. There is an extended sequence where Karen takes over narrating duties from Henry, describing how she falls into the world herself. She is not the normal movie wife who asks for her husband to fix his ways. She wants him in the mob.

The narration is key here. Scorsese has used narration multiple times in his films, but unlike when others use it, it is not to fill in plot holes. Here, as in Taxi Driver, if there were no narration we would have a hard time sympathizing with the “protagonists”. Henry Hill describes to the audience slowly and precisely exactly what is going through his mind at all times, and thus we are fully immersed into the world of a gangster.

But what of the fall? I don’t want to spoil too much of the second half for those who have not seen it, but I want to stress the importance of it. All it takes is a couple mistakes and suddenly everything goes downhill. One of Henry’s best friends is Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci) a hot headed guy who is prone to sudden bursts of ill-advised violence. His explosions provide the most shocking parts of the film, and it is this type of guy who can get you in the most trouble. Towards the beginning we witness the infamous “You think I’m funny?” scene, which provides some of the tensest moments in the film. It’s alarming how fast a man can be killed. At one point Henry alerts the audience as to the exact moment he knows a man is going to be killed, only to have the threat revoked a few minutes later. As Hill states, the guy will never know how close he was to getting killed. Scorsese doesn’t glorify violence, it happens out of nowhere and it’s done quickly. Just like in real life, things don’t slow down as bodies are riddled with bullets.

The music is also crucial here, and it is something Scorsese pays special attention to in all his films. There is no original score here, only various pop songs from the era the movie is in. The music is used to describe the glamour of the life, and eventually the downfall. My favorite sequence in the movie is when the film breaks its normal style and is cut at a breakneck pace. It follows Hill as the walls close in around him over the course of the day. He has seemingly hundreds of errands to run, all while he is on drugs and he thinks he’s about to be arrested. The music is equally chaotic, going between fast and slow seemingly at will. It is as if there is a jukebox behind the screen scoring the action of these character’s lives. If only to symbolize the course of the life in the mob, the film begins with Tony Bennett, and ends with Sid Vicious.

Once you are in the mob, there is no way out. You don’t go on to fortune for long. There may be temporary rewards, but in Goodfellas characters have only one of three fates: they go in hiding, they go to jail, or they die.

SUMMER OF SCORSESE
Original Post
Goodfellas

Up next: Taxi Driver

Summer of Scorsese

The picture above is of crimefighter and film director Martin Scorsese. Since the beginning of the 1970’s he has put together a body of work that has put him at the top of most lists of the greatest filmmakers of all time. For many, he is the best, and in my experience I cannot disagree. Various critics groups have named two of his films, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull as the best films of their respective decades. He is the master of crime and gangster movies, and has various works with subjects ranging from the religious to the comic. In the words of the music group King Missile: “He makes the best f-----g films. If I ever meet him, I'm gonna grab his f-----g neck and just shake him and say 'Thank you, thank you for making such excellent f-----g movies!'”

This leads us to my project for the remainder of the summer: “Summer of Scorsese”. I was going to give him a director profile, but in my head I realized the amount I could write on each film was far too long to fit in such a format. Thus I have decided I will be writing on several of his films as the summer goes on. I will write about the good, the bad, and everything in between. I will write on the films I have seen several times before, and on those I am seeing for the first time. It’s gonna be a blast.

I will not use ratings, because 1) It would be redundant with most films receiving higher grades, and 2) I pretty much hate them anyway.

Don’t worry; I will continue writing on this summer’s movies (frequently), as well as other features.

At the end of each post there will be links to all past entries as part of “Summer of Scorsese”. Also, I will announce what the next film I will tackle is.

I already have written on The Departed and Shutter Island, which you can READ HERE and HERE. I might write on Shutter Island again during this project.

Up first: Goodfellas