Are Marvel Movies Cinema Or Not? It depends on the customer.
In November 2019, Martin Scorsese wrote an opinion piece in The New York Times about Marvel movies.
James Gunn on Instagram responded to the debate that ensued: “Superheroes are simply today’s gangsters/cowboys/outer space adventurers... not everyone will be able to appreciate them, even some geniuses. And that’s okay.”
Marvel Studios’ President Kevin Feige has weighed in as well in The Hollywood Reporter.
He claimed 2015’s Ant-Man was a heist movie, while 2014’s Captain America was a political thriller. In 2018 the studio took a huge risk when half of all characters were killed in Avengers: Infinity War.
At the end of the interview he says “everybody has a different definition of cinema... a different definition of art… of risk.”
I find myself agreeing with Alex Abad-Santos, who writes for Vox:
“It’s possible to love Marvel movies and also be terrified of a future where no one makes anything but Marvel movies.”
Many films today are manufactured for immediate consumption. Many of them are well made by teams of talented, educated individuals, listed in credits that nobody outside the media business pays attention to.
It’s ironic, isn’t it? The only people who care about day-to-day crew members are those who are credited, friends and family, and potential employers.
The common moviegoer couldn’t care less about “below the line” people.
If you're involved with the creative development, you are considered above the line.
And the auteur(s), of course, is the riskiest artist of all above the line professionals.
“For anyone who dreams of making movies or who is just starting out, the situation at this moment is brutal and inhospitable to art. And the act of simply writing those words fills me with terrible sadness.”
Scorsese, The New York Times:
These teams of talented individuals might have gone to film school like me, or you.
They’ve probably seen films by Scorsese, or Alfred Hitchcock, Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, Spike Lee.
But imagine like six people from this teams of diverse individuals, and how they consume their content. Older folks might have seen Scorsese in theaters, but if they are millennials like me they likely saw a Scorsese movie on a laptop with Netflix or Hulu (or bootleg), via the Internet.
A person even younger than me watched Scorsese on a smaller screen, like a Samsung Galaxy or iPhone.
Scorsese’s movie “The Irishman” had its theatrical run for boomers and cinephiles, but it lives forever on Netflix and AWS S3.
It sits next to other gangster movies, some released yesterday or some released in the 1940s, 50s, 60s, from all over the world.
But it all exists on the same timeline for you, the customer.
You have twenty four hours in a day and endless rows of comedies, dramas, anime, and movies to entertain yourself. Not to mention Udemy and MasterClass and Coursera, to educate yourself. YouTube is both, and wellness/health videos.
If you’re like me you eventually just get overwhelmed with choice and just settle down with something familiar.
People used to find what to watch in newspapers, from critics like Roger Ebert of Gene Siskel, the “two thumbs up” guys.
Now you get your “feed” of content from an algorithm on apps like TikTok, where you make zero choices and scroll forever.
Todd Yellin, the Netflix VP of product, notes that important works like Ava DuVernay’s documentary 13th was able to be seen by millions of people because the Netflix algorithm was able to suggest the documentary to the right people at the right time instead of content like Will Smith’s action/fantasy movie Bright.
As DuVernay aptly notes, the film business tends to support people who look like Scorsese (straight white men), so algorithms even the playing field a bit for a female filmmaker of color and her peers.
“My concern isn’t being lost, my concern is being somewhere, period.” - Ava DuVernay, Vulture
So yeah, the “is Marvel cinema” debate is part of a big conversation, with many voices.
You have corporate voices trying to sell toys to go along with their movies.
Artistic voices trying to make risky statements grounded in their truth.
And of course, lots of confused customers who say they can’t care less, they just want to pass the time while they eat their food.
Cinema is dead. Long live content.
Don’t let the reputation fool you. Martin Scorsese’s latest film and a YouTube video of Faze Clan playing Fortnite exist on the same timeline as Ava DuVernay’s 13th or The Weeknd’s SoFi concert on HBO Max.
It really just depends on you, the customer, and what you want to spend your time on.
