Marvel director Joe Russo has seemingly taken a dig at Martin Scorsese over his box office success.
The man behind Avengers: Endgame – which is the second highest grossing film of all time – uploaded a clip on Instagram which shows Scorsese addressing his dog as Oscar.
The clip then cuts to Russo who says: “Argh look he’s got schnauzer, I love schnauzers and his name is Oscar which is really cute,” in reference to Scorsese’s Academy Award nominations over the years and his solitary win for his 2006 film The Departed.
He then shows his own schnauzer dog, which he calls “Box Office” which is thought to be a clear nod to his and his brother Anthony Russo’s Marvel box office hit films.
The clip comes after Scorsese has in the past taken several digs at Marvel movies.
He previously described the movies as “not cinema”, while he also said more recently about the glut of comic book movies in cinemas: “The danger there is what it’s doing to our culture. Because there are going to be generations now that think movies are only those – that’s what movies are.”
When the interviewer proposed many people already think that way, Scorsese agreed, adding: “They already think that. Which means that we have to then fight back stronger. And it’s got to come from the grassroots level.”
“It’s gotta come from the filmmakers themselves. And you’ll have, you know, the Safdie brothers, and you’ll have Chris Nolan, you know what I mean? And hit ‘em from all sides. Hit ‘em from all sides, and don’t give up. Let’s see what you got. Go out there and do it. Go reinvent. Don’t complain about it. But it’s true, because we’ve got to save cinema.”
The director said “manufactured content isn’t really cinema”, adding: “It’s almost like AI making a film. And that doesn’t mean that you don’t have incredible directors and special effects people doing beautiful artwork. But what does it mean? What do these films, what will it give you? Aside from a kind of consummation of something and then eliminating it from your mind, your whole body, you know? So what is it giving you?”
Meanwhile, Scorsese has been promoting his own new movie Killers Of The Flower Moon, his 26th film based on the true story of the murder of more than 60 Native Americans in 1920s Oklahoma which stars Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio as an uncle and nephew plotting to steal the oil underneath the tribe’s land.
In a five-star review of the film, NME wrote: “This is among Scorsese’s most important work. Popular music from the 1920s, Native American songs and Robbie Robertson’s bluesy score help round off this remarkable Western, a film that will linger in the minds of its audience for a long time.”