Scorsese

Welcome to Stab Film!!!

I have been wanting to get this up for a couple of months now and here it is (OK, maybe I should edit that, but what fun is life without double meaning?).

I don't claim to be a great writer or have the correct opinions on everything, but I love film and I could talk for days on end about it, so that's just what I'm going to do.

The first topic of my first personal blog is Mr. Scorsese. When he won the academy award for Best Director, I jumped up out of my chair and jumped for joy like John Elway had come out of retirement and just threw the Super Bowl winning touchdown for the Broncos. Check out the win on YouTube:



It seems that NOT watching the Oscars is in lately. Two people expressed with pride to me that they would not want to watch a bunch of rich people see who gets the big lame award and toot their own horns. What people don't realize is that the Oscars are bigger than these celebrities. It is not about them and it is not about the lows our society has sunk to in regards to celebrity worship. The Oscars are about art. The highest form of art in our civilization today. Film making is a craft which takes the vision of one to several people and spreads out the implementation of making a film to a large group of very talented professionals. Just like a sports team though, it is only as good as the person leading the way. The director.

At the apex of his craft in every aspect is Scorsese. He not only has the vision and talent, but he has the demeanor and personality to pull together the crew and actors to bring a screenplay to life.

After he won, I also talked friends and heard many critics say they did not think he necessarily deserved an Oscar for this film but was awarded based on the fact that he had not won for such great films as Raging Bull(1980) and Goodfellas(1990). I'm not ever going to argue that he should have won for both of these (particularly for Goodfellas going against Dances With Wolves). I will defend that The Departed(2006) had every right to win for best director and Best Picture.



Scorsese deserved to win Best Director for The Departed. Most arguments I hear have nothing to do with the competition he was up against this year, but compare The Departed with Scorsese's past films. Check out, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17351684/

He was not competing with himself. It is also my opinion that you cannot compare a majority of Scorsese's pictures to one another and especially to other films. I am not saying there are not films being made of the same caliber, or filmmakers of the same caliber. Martin Scorsese is a student of film who is constantly trying to re-define himself and has become the best filmmaker we will probably ever see. If we are putting Martin up against any other director today, there is no competition.

As for Best Picture, it was a very tight field this year with some great films about important subject matter, but in the end, The Departed was as good or better a film as any of them.

OK, that's the end of my essay. I hope you like it and I hope you agree. If not, then that's OK too. I'm not a film snob like my sister likes to think I am.