Martin Scorsese criticized box office numbers during his recent appearance at the New York Film Festival (via Indiewire). The Oscar-winning director described the industry’s obsession with box office profits as “disgusting” and “really insulting.” Scorsese praised the festival for endorsing filmmaking at a time when “cinema is underestimated, insulted, and belittled on all sides, not necessarily the commercial aspect but certainly the art.”
“Since the ’80s, there’s been a focus on numbers. It’s kind of gross,” Scorsese said. “The cost of the movie is one thing. Understand that a movie costs a certain amount, and they at least expect a refund… The focus is now on the numbers, the cost, the opening weekend, how much it was made in the US, how much it was made in England, how much it was made in Asia, how much it was made in the whole world, how many viewers it got. . As a filmmaker, and as someone who cannot imagine life without cinema, I always find it really insulting.
Scorsese added, “I’ve always known that such considerations have no place at the New York Film Festival, and here’s the key: There are no awards here. You don’t have to compete. You just have to love the cinema here.”
Edgar Wright, Scorsese’s outspoken lover, shared similar thoughts earlier this month during a BBC Maestro session. Wright recalled how it bombed the cult of his classic Scott Pilgrim Against the World over its opening weekend, yet it was not seen as a disappointment all these subsequent years.
“I’ve said this to other filmmakers since they had a similar initial reaction to a movie like Scott Pilgrim, is that a three-day weekend isn’t the end of any movie’s story. People shouldn’t accept that idea,” Wright said. Movies by their box office is like football fans of movies. Most of my favorite films that are today’s classics were not considered successful in their time.”
Wright added, “You can point to hundreds of classic films, whether it’s ‘Citizen Kane’, ‘Blade Runner,’ or ‘The Big Lebowski.’ So the way the movie operates in its first three days is never the end of the story, the further away we get from that rhetoric.” About that box office numbers are the entirety of the movie, the better.”
Scorsese is currently in post-production on the $200 million Western drama Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro. The film will be shown in theaters and will air on Apple TV + in 2023.
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