This was the reason why Scorsese considered retiring from cinema

We like it better or worse, we all know that Martin Scorsese eat, drink and breathe cinema. Director of The Moon Killers He is not only one of the most distinguished filmmakers in the world, but also a compulsive devourer of films who confesses to owing his life to the seventh art. What could be the reason, then, for him to consider never approaching a camera again?

This reason fits into two words: “Harvey Weinstein.” As Scorsese confessed in an interview for GQ, his dealings with the tyrannical head of Miramax during the filming of Gangs of New York They made him seriously consider his vocation.

It is well known that the production of the film, the first title on which Scorsese worked with Leonardo Dicaprio, It was pure suffering for the director. But, according to Marty himself, this torment went further than we imagined. “I realized that if they forced me to make films that way, I wouldn’t be able to work again,” he explains.

“If that was the only way they were going to allow me films, I would have to leave it, because the results did not satisfy me,” Scorsese continues. “There were extremely difficult times, and I couldn’t survive. I would end up dying. And I decided it was over, really.”

Praised for its sumptuous staging and interpretation of Daniel Day-Lewis, Gangs of New York It was also the beginning of the friendship between Marty and Leonardo DiCaprio, one of his favorite actors. So, Scorsese had second thoughts when he was offered to direct The Aviator, again with Leo as the protagonist. The problem was that Weinstein also wanted to participate in that film.

“I was against that: there was a meeting, and they forced me to accept this position,” says the director. “They had already given me the hype, as people say, and I had no way of getting out. But the filming went well, and the editing also went well until the last weeks. Then those people arrived and did extremely unpleasant things.”

Scorsese refers to the decision by Warner and Miramax to cut the budget of The Aviator, something that forced him to put half a million dollars out of pocket to finish the movie. So, Marty once again threw his hat into the ring, claiming that his film career was over.

But then it came Infiltrators, and although that production was not free of disappointments (“They wanted the characters of Leo and Matt Damon survived history to make a franchise”) brought with it its first Oscar for Best Director and won a new generation of fans for his films.

Today, after so much suffering, Martin Scorsese remains a director, not only admired, but also loved and respected by film buffs around the world. Harvey Weinstein, however, serves a total of 38 years in prison (23 in New York, 16 in Los Angeles) for multiple cases of sexual abuse. It is possible that this fable has a moral, but, if so, it is better for each one to draw it for themselves.

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