Martin Scorsese Biography
Summary
"Martin Marcantonio Luciano Scorsese" (IPA: AmE: ; Ita: ) (b. November 17, 1942) is an iconic Italian-American Academy Award-winning film director, writer and producer. Also affectionately known as "Marty", he is also the founder of the World Cinema Foundation and a recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award for his contributions to the cinema and has won awards from the Golden Globe, BAFTA, and Directors Guild of America. Scorsese is president of the Film Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to film preservation and the prevention of the decaying of motion picture film stock.
Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian American identity, Roman Catholic concepts of guilt and redemption, machismo, and the violence endemic in American society. Scorsese is widely considered to be one of the most significant and influential American filmmakers of his era. He earned an MFA in film directing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts.
Childhood
Martin Scorsese was born in New York City. His father, Luciano Charles Scorsese (1900-1993), and mother, Catherine Scorsese (née Cappa; 1912-1997), both worked in New York's Garment District, his father as a clothes presser and his mother as a seamstress. It was at this stage in his life that he developed his passion for cinema. Scorsese developed an admiration for neo-realist cinema. He recounted its influence in a documentary on Italian neorealism, and commented on how "The Bicycle Thief" inspired him and how this influenced his view or portrayal of his Sicilian heritage. His initial desire to become a priest was forsaken for cinema - the seminary traded for NYU Film School, where he received his MFA in film directing in 1969.
Early career
Although the Vietnam War had started at the time, Scorsese was able to avoid military service. He attended New York University's film school (B.A., English, 1963; M.F.A., film, 1966) making the short films "What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?" (1963) and "It's Not Just You, Murray!" (1964). His most famous short of the period is the darkly comic "The Big Shave" (1967), which featured an unnamed man who shaves himself until profusely bleeding, ultimately slitting his own throat with his razor. The film is an indictment of America's involvement in Vietnam, suggested by its alternative title "Viet '67".
Also in 1967, Scorsese made his first feature-length film, the black and white "Who's That Knocking at My Door" with fellow student, actor Harvey Keitel, and editor Thelma Schoonmaker both of whom were to become long-term collaborators.
This film was a precursor to his later "Mean Streets". Even in embryonic form, the 'Scorsese style' was already evident: a feel for New York Italian American street-life, rapid editing, an eclectic rock soundtrack and a troubled male protagonist.
1970s
From there he became a friend and acquaintance of the so-called 'movie brats' of the 1970s: Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg. It was De Palma who introduced actor Robert De Niro to Scorsese, and the two figures became close friends, working together on many projects. During this period the director worked as one of the editors on the movie "Woodstock" and met actor-director John Cassavetes, who would also go on to become a close friend and mentor.
"Mean Streets"
In 1972 Scorsese made the Depression-era gangster film "Boxcar Bertha" for B-movie producer Roger Corman, who had also helped directors such as Francis Ford Coppola, James Cameron and John Sayles launch their careers. While it is widely considered a minor work, "Boxcar Bertha" nonetheless taught Scorsese how to make films cheaply and quickly, preparing him for his first film with De Niro, "Mean Streets".
Championed by influential movie critic Pauline Kael, "Mean Streets" was a breakthrough for Scorsese, De Niro and Keitel. By now the signature Scorsese style was in place: macho posturing, bloody violence, Catholic guilt and redemption, gritty New York locale, rapid-fire editing, and a rock soundtrack. Although the film was innovative, its wired atmosphere, edgy documentary style and gritty street-level direction owed a debt to directors Cassavetes and early Jean-Luc Godard. (Indeed the film was completed with much encouragement from Cassavetes, who felt "Boxcar Bertha" was undeserving of the young director's prodigious talent.)
In 1974 actress Ellen Burstyn chose Scorsese to direct her in "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore", for which she won an Academy Award for Best Actress. Although well regarded, the film remains an anomaly in the director's early career, as it focuses on a central female character.
Returning to Little Italy to explore his ethnic roots, Scorsese next came up with "Italianamerican", a documentary featuring his parents, Charles and Catherine Scorsese.
"Taxi Driver"
Two years later, in 1976, Scorsese sent shockwaves through the cinema world when he directed the iconic "Taxi Driver", an unrelentingly grim and violent portrayal of one man's slow descent into insanity in a hellishly conceived Manhattan.
Scorsese's direction by now was highly accomplished, using jump cuts, expressionist lighting, point of view shots and slow motion to reflect the protagonist's heightened psychological awareness. However "Taxi Driver"'s immense power was due in part to Robert De Niro's intense lead performance. The film co-starred Jodie Foster in a highly controversial role as an underage prostitute, and Harvey Keitel as her pimp, 'Sport' Matthew.
"Taxi Driver" also marked the start of a series of collaborations with writer Paul Schrader. The film bears strong thematic links to (and makes several allusions to) the work of French director Robert Bresson, most explicitly "Pickpocket" (in essence the 'diary' of a loner/obsessive who finds redemption). Writer/director Schrader often returns to Bresson's work in films such as "American Gigolo", "Light Sleeper" and Scorsese's later "Bringing Out the Dead".
Already controversial upon its release, "Taxi Driver" hit the headlines again five years later, when John Hinckley, Jr. made an assassination attempt on then-President Ronald Reagan. He subsequently blamed his act on his obsession with Jodie Foster's "Taxi Driver" character (in the film, De Niro's character, Travis Bickle, makes an assassination attempt on a senator).
"Taxi Driver" won the Palme d'Or at the 1976 Cannes film festival, also receiving four Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, although all were unsuccessful.
Scorsese was subsequently offered the role of Charles Manson in the movie "Helter Skelter" and a part in Sam Fuller's war movie "The Big Red One", but he turned both down. However he did accept the role of a gangster in exploitation movie "Cannonball" directed by Paul Bartel. In this period there were also several directorial projects that never got off the ground including "Haunted Summer", about Mary Shelley and a film with Marlon Brando about the Indian massacre at Wounded Knee.
"New York, New York" and "The Last Waltz"
The critical success of "Taxi Driver" encouraged Scorsese to move ahead with his first big-budget project: the highly stylized musical "New York, New York". This tribute to Scorsese's home town and the classic Hollywood musical was a box-office and critical failure.
"New York, New York" was the director's third collaboration with Robert De Niro, co-starring with Liza Minnelli (a tribute and allusion to her father, legendary musical director Vincente Minnelli). Although possessing Scorsese's usual visual panache and stylistic bravura, many critics felt its enclosed studio-bound atmosphere left it leaden in comparison to his earlier work. Often overlooked, it remains one of the director's early key studies in male paranoia and insecurity (and hence is in direct thematic lineage with "Mean Streets", "Taxi Driver," the later "Raging Bull", and the director's most recent film, "The Departed").
The disappointing reception "New York, New York" received drove Scorsese into depression. By this stage the director had also developed a serious cocaine addiction. However, he did find the creative drive to make the highly regarded "The Last Waltz", documenting the final concert by The Band. It was held at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, and featured one of the most extensive lineups of prominent guest performers at a single concert, including Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Neil Diamond, Ringo Starr, Muddy Waters, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Van Morrison. However, Scorsese's commitments to other projects delayed the release of the film until 1978. Another Scorsese-directed documentary entitled "American Boy" also appeared in 1978 focusing on Steve Prince, the cocky gun salesman who appeared in "Taxi Driver". A period of wild partying followed, damaging the director's already fragile health.
1980s
"Raging Bull"
By many accounts (Scorsese's included), Robert De Niro practically saved his life when he persuaded him to kick his cocaine addiction to make what many consider his greatest film, "Raging Bull" (1980). Convinced that he would never make another movie, he poured his energies into making this violent biopic of middleweight boxing champion Jake La Motta, calling it a Kamikaze method of film-making. The film is widely viewed as a masterpiece and was voted the greatest film of the 1980s by Britain's "Sight & Sound" magazine. It received eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Robert De Niro, and Scorsese's first for Best Director. De Niro won, as did Thelma Schoonmaker for editing, but best director went to Robert Redford for "Ordinary People".
"Raging Bull", filmed in high contrast black and white, is where the director's style reached its zenith: "Taxi Driver" and "New York, New York" had used elements of expressionism to replicate psychological point of view, but here the style was taken to new extremes, employing extensive slow-motion, complex tracking shots, and extravagant distortion of perspective (for example, the size of boxing rings would change from fight to fight). Thematically too, the concerns carried on from "Mean Streets" and "Taxi Driver": insecure males, violence, guilt, and redemption.
Although the screenplay for "Raging Bull" was credited to Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin (who earlier co-wrote "Mean Streets"), the finished script differed extensively from Schrader's original draft. It was re-written several times by various writers including Jay Cocks (who went on to co-script later Scorsese films "The Age of Innocence" and "Gangs of New York"). The final draft was largely written by Scorsese and Robert De Niro.
"The King of Comedy"
Scorsese's next project was his fifth collaboration with Robert De Niro, "The King of Comedy" (1983). An absurdist satire on the world of media and celebrity, it was an obvious departure from the more emotionally committed films he had become associated with. Visually too it was far less kinetic than the style the director had developed up until this point, often using a static camera and long takes. The expressionism of his recent work here gave way to moments of almost total surrealism. However it was still an obvious Scorsese work, and apart from the New York locale, it bore many similarities to "Taxi Driver", not least of which was its focus on an obsessed troubled loner who ironically achieves iconic status through a criminal act (murder and kidnapping, respectively).
"The King of Comedy" failed at the box office but has become increasingly well regarded by critics in the years since its release. It is arguable that its themes of vacuous show business and celebrity obsession are more pertinent today than when the film was originally released. German director Wim Wenders numbered it among his fifteen favourite films.
Next Scorsese made a brief cameo appearance in the movie "Pavlova: A Woman for All Time", originally intended to be directed by one his heroes, Michael Powell. This led to a more significant role in Bertrand Tavernier's jazz movie "Round Midnight".
In 1983 Scorsese began work on a long-cherished personal project, "The Last Temptation of Christ", based on the 1951 book written by Nikos Kazantzakis (who was introduced to the director by actress Barbara Hershey when they were both attending New York University in the late 1960s). The movie was slated to shoot under the Paramount Studios banner, but shortly before principal photography was to commence, Paramount pulled the plug on the project, citing pressure from religious groups. In this aborted 1983 version, Aidan Quinn was cast as Jesus, and Sting was cast as Pontius Pilate. (In the 1988 version, these roles were played by Willem Dafoe and David Bowie.)
"After Hours"
After the collapse of this project Scorsese again saw his career at a critical point, as he described in the recent documentary "Filming for Your Life: Making 'After Hours" (2004). He saw that in the increasingly commercial world of 1980s Hollywood the highly stylized and personal 1970s films he and others had built their careers on would not continue to enjoy the same status, and decided on an almost totally new approach to his work. With "After Hours" (1985) he made an aesthetic shift back to a pared-down, almost 'underground' film-making style - his way of staying viable. Filmed on an extremely low budget, on location, and at night in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan, the film is a black comedy about one increasingly misfortunate night for a mild New York word processor (Griffin Dunne) and featured cameos by such disparate actors as Teri Garr and Cheech and Chong. A bit of a stylistic anomaly for Scorsese, "After Hours" fits in well with popular low-budget 'cult' films of the 1980s, e.g. Jonathan Demme's "Something Wild" and Alex Cox's "Repo Man".
"The Color of Money"
Along with the iconic 1987 Michael Jackson music video "Bad", in 1986 Scorsese made "The Color of Money", a sequel to the much admired Paul Newman film "The Hustler" (1960). ("The Hustler" was directed by Robert Rossen, whose 1940s boxing film "Body and Soul" was a major influence on "Raging Bull".) Although typically visually assured, "The Color of Money" was the director's first foray into mainstream commercial film-making. It won actor Paul Newman a belated Oscar and gave Scorsese the clout to finally secure backing for a project that had been a long time goal for him: "The Last Temptation of Christ". He also made a brief venture into television, directing an episode of Steven Spielberg's "Amazing Stories".
"The Last Temptation of Christ"
After his mid-80s flirtation with commercial Hollywood, Scorsese made a major return to personal film-making with the Paul Schrader-scripted "The Last Temptation of Christ" in 1988. Based on Nikos Kazantzakis's controversial 1951 book, it retold the life of Christ in human rather than divine terms. Even prior to its release the film caused a massive furore, worldwide protests against its perceived blasphemy effectively turning a low budget independent movie into a media sensation. Most controversy centered on the final passages of the film which depicted Christ marrying and raising a family with Mary Magdalene in a Satan-induced hallucination while on the cross.
Looking past the controversy, "The Last Temptation of Christ" gained critical acclaim and remains an important work in Scorsese's canon: an explicit attempt to wrestle with the spirituality which had under-pinned his films up until that point. The director went on to receive his second nomination for a Best Director Academy Award (again unsuccessfully, this time losing to Barry Levinson for "Rain Man").
Along with directors Woody Allen and Francis Coppola, in 1989 Scorsese provided one of three segments in the portmanteau film "New York Stories", called 'Life Lessons'.
1990s
"Goodfellas"
After a decade of mostly mixed results, gangster epic "Goodfellas" (1990) was a return to form for Scorsese and his most confident and fully realized film since "Raging Bull". A return to Little Italy, De Niro, and Joe Pesci, "Goodfellas" offered a virtuoso display of the director's bravura cinematic technique and re-established, enhanced, and consolidated his reputation. The film is widely considered one of the director's greatest achievements.
However, "Goodfellas" also signified an important shift in tone in the director's work, inaugurating an era in his career which was technically accomplished but some have argued emotionally detached. Despite this, many view "Goodfellas" as a Scorsese archetype - the apogee of his cinematic technique.
Scorsese earned his third Best Director nomination for "Goodfellas" but again lost to a first-time director, Kevin Costner ("Dances with Wolves"). The film also earned Joe Pesci an Academy Award (Best Supporting Actor)
In 1990, he acted in a cameo role as Vincent Van Gogh in the film "Dreams" by legendary Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.
"Cape Fear"
1991 brought "Cape Fear", a remake of a cult 1962 movie of the same name, and the director's seventh collaboration with De Niro. Another foray in to the mainstream, the film was a stylized Grand Guignol thriller taking its cues heavily from Alfred Hitchcock and Charles Laughton's "The Night of the Hunter" (1955). "Cape Fear" received a mixed critical reception and was lambasted in many quarters for its scenes depicting misogynistic violence. However, the lurid subject matter did give Scorsese a chance to experiment with a dazzling array of visual tricks and effects. The film garnered two Oscar nominations. Earning eighty million dollars domestically, it would stand as Scorsese's most commercially successful release until "The Aviator" (2004), and then 'The Departed' (2006). The film also marked the first time Scorsese used wide-screen Panavision with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1.
"The Age of Innocence"
The opulent and handsomely mounted "The Age of Innocence" (1993) was on the surface a huge departure for Scorsese, a period adaptation of Edith Wharton's novel about the constrictive high society of late-19th Century New York. It was highly lauded by critics upon original release, but was a box office bomb. However, it is much closer to Scorsese's other films than one would expect with underlying themes of guilt discernible in his other films being evident, as well as the theme of a young man trying to lead a good life amid obstacles and temptations, which is evident in almost all his films. In fact Scorsese claimed that not only does he consider this his most 'violent' film, but his most personal, the one that came closest to his original personal vision, and considers this his highest achievement, along with the severely underrated "Kundun". Recently, it has started to come back into the public eye, especially in countries such as the UK and France, but still is largely neglected in North America. The film earned five Academy Award nominations (including for Scorsese for Best Adapted Screenplay), winning the Costume Design Oscar.
This was his first collaboration with the Academy Award winning actor, Daniel Day-Lewis, with whom he would work again in "Gangs of New York".
"Casino"
1995's expansive "Casino", like "The Age of Innocence" before it, focused on a tightly wound male whose well-ordered life is disrupted by the arrival of unpredictable forces. The fact that it was a violent gangster film made it more palatable to fans of the director who perhaps were baffled by the apparent departure of the earlier film. Critically, however, "Casino" received mixed notices. In large part this was due to its huge stylistic similarities to his earlier "Goodfellas". Indeed many of the tropes and tricks of the earlier film resurfaced more or less intact, most obviously the casting of Joe Pesci as an unbridled psychopath. "Casino" was by some considerable distance perhaps Scorsese's most violent and detached film, its early establishing scenes verging on documentary. Any critical misgivings were tempered by the fact the movie remains an extraordinary technical achievement, running to three hours in length. Sharon Stone was nominated for the Best Actress Academy Award for her performance.
"A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies"
Scorsese still found time for a four hour documentary in 1995 offering a thorough trek through American cinema. It covered the silent era to 1969, a year after which Scorsese began his feature career, stating 'I wouldn't feel right commenting on myself or my contemporaries.'
"Kundun"
If "The Age of Innocence" alienated and confused some fans, then "Kundun" (1997) went several steps further, offering an account of the early life of Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, the invasion of Tibet by China, and the Dalai Lama's subsequent exile to India. Not least a departure in subject matter, "Kundun" also saw Scorsese employing a fresh narrative and visual approach. Traditional dramatic devices were substituted for a trance-like meditation achieved through an elaborate tableau of colourful visual images.
The film was a source of turmoil for its distributor, Disney, who were planning significant expansion into the Chinese market at the time. Initially defiant in the face of pressure from Chinese officials, Disney has since distanced itself from the project, hurting "Kundun"s commercial profile.
In the short term, the sheer eclecticism in evidence enhanced the director's reputation. In the long term however, it generally appears "Kundun" has been sidelined in most critical appraisals of the director, mostly noted as a stylistic and thematic detour. "Kundun" was the director's second attempt to profile the life of a great religious leader, following "The Last Temptation of Christ".
"Bringing Out the Dead"
"Bringing Out the Dead" (1999) was a return to familiar territory, with the director and writer Paul Schrader constructing a pitch-black comic take on their own earlier "Taxi Driver". Like previous Scorsese-Schrader collaborations, its final scenes of spiritual redemption explicitly recalled the films of Robert Bresson. (It's also worth noting that the film's incident-filled nocturnal setting is reminiscent of "After Hours".) It received generally positive reviews, although not the universal critical acclaim of some of his other films.
Credit
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article about Martin Scorsese.
