Film

Here’s Your Explainer On The Wild (And Endless) James Gunn And Martin Scorsese Beef

This week, Gunn fired a new shot in the extremely tiring culture war.

by Joseph Earp  5 August 2021
martin scorsese james gunn beef photo

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James Gunn, director of forthcoming superhero adaptation The Suicide Squad, has fired a new shot in the endless war between comic book culture and Martin Scorsese.

Yep, seems like we can’t go a week or two without Scorsese yet again coming under fire for comments that he made about superhero movies not being “cinema.” For those with mercifully short memories, here’s a primer.

Funnily Enough, Scorsese Isn’t A Marvel Fan

The argy-bargy was kicked off thanks to an op-ed the venerated director penned for The New York Times, in which he lamented the lack of choice cinemagoers get in the modern franchise-obsessed era.

“When I was in England in early October, I gave an interview to Empire magazine,” the op-ed reads. “I was asked a question about Marvel movies. I answered it. I said that I’ve tried to watch a few of them and that they’re not for me, that they seem to me to be closer to theme parks than they are to movies as I’ve known and loved them throughout my life, and that in the end, I don’t think they’re cinema.

“Some people seem to have seized on the last part of my answer as insulting, or as evidence of hatred for Marvel on my part. If anyone is intent on characterizing my words in that light, there’s nothing I can do to stand in the way.”

Since that op-ed was published, Scorsese has been called on to refine his comments time and time again. Moreover, directors of Marvel and DC properties have been asked to assess the strength of his arguments. Their responses have ranged from the genuinely funny — Zack Snyder claimed he was fine with the comments, because he was “certain” that Scorsese didn’t mean his movies — to the insufferable.

Now James Gunn Has Entered The Fray

The comments of James Gunn straddle these two polar extremes. Gunn is, for the most part, a good sport about the role he plays in the superhero machine. He’s a humble filmmaker, one who emerged from the notoriously lo-fi stew of Troma, and who appears genuinely grateful for all of the chances that he’s gotten to make his art. He knows that this is all for fun, and the irreverence that he brings to his movies is matched by the irreverence he clearly feels for the business known as show.

But his latest comments are irritatingly divisive. Gunn has claimed that the comments made by Scorsese were deliberate attempts to stir attention for his then new film The Irishman.

“He just kept coming out against Marvel so that he could get press for his movie,” Gunn said as part of an interview with fabled entertainment journalist Josh Horowitz. “He’s creating his movie in the shadow of the Marvel films, and so he uses that to get attention for something he wasn’t getting as much attention as he wanted for it.”

Naturally, It’s Now A Meme

In the hours since Gunn made the comments, the internet has been awash with memes and hot takes. In fact, the furore got so intense that Gunn later took to his Twitter to clarify his remarks, calling Scorsese “probably the world’s greatest living American filmmaker.

“I love & study his films & will continue to love & study his films,” Gunn wrote, establishing that the only point of contention he has with Scorsese is over the argument that “films based on comic books are innately not cinema.”

Of course, the irony of all this is that Gunn’s comments are well-timed to draw attention to his own forthcoming movie, The Suicide Squad. Seems a little bit like the pot is calling the kettle black on this one.

Not, again, that it’s entirely Gunn’s fault. The problem doesn’t lie solely with individual filmmakers firing shots at each other. The problem lies with the entire entertainment industry machine, and the role that journalists and their editors play in that machine. Every publication wants to spawn follow-up articles like this one, so every publication is looking for the most incendiary, conversation-generating take. Getting directors to weigh in on the Scorsese-comic book stoush is just a way to get more clicks and attention.

This war, which has now been going on for two years, will only stop when journalists hold their tongues and resist asking every filmmaker under the sun what they think about the superhero cinema industry. We can only hope that happens sometime soon.