Martin Scorsese

Erroneously hailed as the most important director working today, Martin Scorsese and his Oscar win for The Departed certainly have people excited. That a man with so many Oscar misses and finally a win is not surprisingly newsworthy, but its disappointing that all of the attention has to be for a film that doesn't come close to being his best. One needs look no further than Raging Bull for an example of a master craftsman at the top of his game. The film is at once relevant, contemporary and also timeless. The Departed is a fun, slightly sloppy cat-and-mouse espionage remake, hardly even a peer of Raging Bull or Taxi Driver. But heck, with the abysmal state of movies today the award might as well go to someone who has made a few good ones.

To me Scorsese isn't an important director because of the films he's made, though he's made some fine ones. I love the guy because of how he uses his celebrity. Scorsese makes big, modern, ballsy films that everyone loves and then goes and uses the resources that come with being a big, modern ballsy filmmaker to support the preservation of classic film through The Film Foundation. I get excited everytime he is on TV talking about how important it is to preserve films, or to study foreign ones (see his My Voyage to Italy). The truth of the matter is that film appreciation and preservation does not have a more accessible voice than that of Martin Scorsese. Robert A. Harris may spread the gospel more eloquently, but his audience is limited to those who already love what he is doing. Scorsese has the ability to reach the masses and to get them to pay at least a little attention to how important preserving our filmic past really is.

To me nothing is more worthy of an Oscar.