The movie Martin Scorsese calls a “lost art”
Whether you’re a cinephile or a casual movie-goer, you’ve likely seen a Martin Scorsese movie. Boasting equal doses of critical and commercial appeal, the filmmaker has routinely made feature films that have earned both box-office success and received countless accolades.
Famously, Scorsese was a significant contributor to the New Hollywood movement, emerging in the late 1960s with movies that challenged the status quo of typical mainstream filmmaking. The director’s ‘70s movies Mean Streets and Taxi Driver were monumental, exploring the darker side of modern American life through reflections on violence, religion, urban decay and isolation. Shot beautifully and accompanied by expertly crafted soundtracks, Scorsese’s ‘70s output cemented him as one of the most important voices among a new generation of filmmakers.
As Scorsese’s career progressed, he shifted to making much more grandiose, big-budget productions, with several running for over three hours, such as The Irishman and Killers of the Flower Moon. Making such long, epic movies requires immense skill – the filmmaker must know how to correctly pace the movie and keep the audience hooked for an extended period of time.
Scorsese has looked back to other acclaimed lengthy productions in order to execute his own, citing movies such as Lawrence of Arabia and Once Upon A Time in the West as some of his favourite long films, finding himself enamoured by their sheer scope.
However, he also cites the divisive The Fall of The Roman Empire by Anthony Mann as one of his favourites – an epic historical drama that clocks in at just over three hours. Upon its release, most critics derided the movie, such as the iconic film reviewer Bosley Crowther, who proudly wrote, “You’re likely to have the feeling after sitting through its more than three hours (not counting time out for intermission), that the Roman Empire has fallen on you.”
However, to the Raging Bull director, the movie “has the poignant beauty of a lost art”. Released in 1964, the movie came at a time when classic epic Hollywood dramas were in their last decade of success, with Scorsese explaining, “For this was the autumn of the great American epics. They simply became too expensive to make.”
Certainly, after several epics proved to be box-office failures, such as The Fall of the Roman Empire, which grossed $4.8million against a $16m budget, Hollywood studios couldn’t afford to keep making them. Thus, it wasn’t until technological advancements such as CGI and other special effects techniques that epic modern blockbusters were able to dominate again.
Scorsese continued, “Like Howard Hawks, Anthony Mann had been a master of the western. The Fall of the Roman Empire offered a multi-layered drama which was as intense as any of the director’s westerns.”
The movie had a star-studded cast, including Sophia Loren, Omar Sharif, James Mason and Alec Guinness, yet many of these actors were criticised by contemporary reviewers. Only in recent years has critical opinion changed, with Scorsese championing Mann’s spectacle.
“His sense of space and dramatic composition has never been more evident,” Scorsese added. “Throughout the film, you can hear the gods laugh in the background. A cruel laugh that spelled the doom of all the protagonists and of the Roman Empire.”
