WEBVTT - Martin Scorsese (Pt. 2): One Night. One Murder. Five Directors 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:03.440 This episode contains content that may be disturbing to some listeners. 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:05.760 Please check the show notes for more information. 0:00:07.440 --> 0:00:13.080 Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. This episode tells 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:15.720 the story of a long standing Hollywood myth, one that 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:19.919 Martin Scorsese eventually acknowledged in an interview with Stephen Spielberg 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:24.120 in twenty fifteen. Now, Spielberg and director Brian de Palma 0:00:24.160 --> 0:00:26.680 have both recounted this story on the record in other 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:30.360 places as well, Spielberg most notably in the excellent Peter 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:34.760 Biskin book Easy Riders in Raging Bulls. I of course 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:38.640 have no idea what specific words were spoken during the 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:42.519 faithful night in question. However, just as the directors in 0:00:42.600 --> 0:00:45.880 this story who are the main characters in this story, 0:00:45.920 --> 0:00:49.159 Steven Spielberg, Brian de Palma, John Millius, Paul Schrader, and 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:51.800 Martin Scorsese, just as they have done in the numerous 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:56.400 films they've directed depicting real life events, films like Schindler's List, 0:00:56.480 --> 0:00:59.400 The Untouchables, Dillinger, Raging Bull and The Irishman, to name 0:00:59.440 --> 0:01:02.840 a few, I followed their lead and relied not only 0:01:02.920 --> 0:01:05.640 on research of the event in question, but also on 0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:08.840 research are the characters in this story to inform the 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:09.920 dialogue here. 0:01:09.840 --> 0:01:12.520 In Metal Job. 0:01:26.080 --> 0:01:28.400 This is a story of one of the greatest movies 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:32.080 of all time, a movie that was fictional, with real 0:01:32.120 --> 0:01:35.920 life murder coursing through the filmmaking. And this is a 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:38.559 story about one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. 0:01:39.400 --> 0:01:41.959 Actually it's a story about a couple of the greatest 0:01:41.959 --> 0:01:45.559 filmmakers of all time. And it's about life and death 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:49.200 and art and all the things that make us suckers 0:01:49.240 --> 0:01:53.120 for great drama. It's a story about one night in particular, 0:01:53.600 --> 0:01:58.480 one time in Hollywood in particular, and revenge. It's a 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:03.280 story about Martin Scorset in his film Taxi Driver, a 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:07.280 film whose composer died only hours after completing the movie's 0:02:07.280 --> 0:02:12.160 intense score. Great music, Unlike that music. I played a 0:02:12.200 --> 0:02:15.040 few at the top of the show that wasn't great music. 0:02:16.160 --> 0:02:19.520 That was a preset loop from my melotron called Firing 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:24.720 Squad Audition MK two. I played you that loop because 0:02:24.720 --> 0:02:27.440 I can't afford the rights to Fifty Ways to Leave 0:02:27.480 --> 0:02:31.080 Your Lover by Paul Simon. And why would I play 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:34.880 you that specific slice of internal rhyme cheese? Could I 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:38.720 afford it because that was the number one song in 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:43.560 America on February eighth, nineteen seventy six, and that was 0:02:43.600 --> 0:02:47.880 the day Taxi Driver hit theaters, marking the continuation of 0:02:47.919 --> 0:02:54.400 one of the greatest careers in filmmaking. On this episode Life, Death, 0:02:55.000 --> 0:03:01.480 Art Revenge, seventies Hollywood in Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver, I'm 0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:37.480 Jake Brennan and this this disgrace Land. People think making 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:39.880 a movie is a lot like making anything else. 0:03:40.800 --> 0:03:41.120 It's not. 0:03:42.080 --> 0:03:44.320 It's not like making a record, it's not like writing 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:44.720 a book. 0:03:44.960 --> 0:03:45.720 It's not even like. 0:03:45.640 --> 0:03:49.240 Staging a play. It's infinitely more difficult than all of 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:52.960 those things. People who make records and write books and 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:57.520 stage plays, for the most part, cannot make movies. And 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:00.960 there's a reason they don't, because it's this savage endeavor 0:04:00.960 --> 0:04:03.880 that will quite literally kill you and destroy your soul 0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:09.000 if you're not careful and or lucky or both. Some 0:04:09.080 --> 0:04:12.920 have compared making a movie to going to war. I've 0:04:12.960 --> 0:04:15.200 never been to war, so I'm not gonna go that far. 0:04:15.280 --> 0:04:16.920 But I think a better. 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:19.880 Analogy, though also imperfect, would be to say making a 0:04:19.920 --> 0:04:23.680 movie is a lot like giving birth every day for 0:04:23.800 --> 0:04:27.520 two years straight. I was there in the room for 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:30.120 the birth of both of my sons. I saw the 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:33.400 excruciating pain my wife went through as both of those 0:04:33.440 --> 0:04:36.880 big headed Brennans passed through her birth canal. And before 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:39.159 you guys send me your hate mail, I ran this 0:04:39.240 --> 0:04:42.719 analogy by my wife, who sanctioned in the pain of 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:45.960 birth is unimaginable to me, but I know that that 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:50.520 pain is concentrated. At the most we're talking twenty four hours, 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:55.640 but usually less. Imagine that pain over and over again 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:59.599 every single day for two years, and now we're getting 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:03.680 close the pain involved with making a movie. Every day 0:05:03.800 --> 0:05:07.159 a new fight, a new hassle, a new raging fire 0:05:07.240 --> 0:05:11.400 to put out, another existential artistic challenge, to navigate another 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:16.000 chip off your soul. I've made records, I've written and 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:19.200 published a book, and yes, I even tried getting a 0:05:19.200 --> 0:05:22.720 big budget Hollywood movie made with an A list celebrity involved. 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:25.480 And I can tell you trying to make a movie 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:29.680 is a brutal, soul sucking endeavor that is not for 0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:34.839 the faint of heart. Hollywood is sodom disguised as paradise. 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:37.040 It's lot's wife bent. 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:40.520 Brutally over the back of a casting coach. It's pimps 0:05:40.520 --> 0:05:44.760 bobbing through fresh chum for their ten percent. It's shameless ambition, 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:48.840 wafting like beastly pheromones on the back of the Santa Anas. Well, 0:05:48.880 --> 0:05:50.880 once you make it over the moat, patrolled by an 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.000 army of lizard skinned assistance, and into the hallowed grounds 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:57.600 of the studio system, that's when quote all the animals 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:02.560 come out, the horrors, skunk pussies, queens, fairies, doper's, junkies, 0:06:02.560 --> 0:06:09.039 sick venyl unquote. Hollywood is relentless. It never lets you 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:12.320 off the hook, no matter how successful you are, no 0:06:12.320 --> 0:06:17.760 matter how psychotic you are. So listen, you fuckers, you screwheads. 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:21.080 Here is a man who would not take it anymore, 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:24.640 a man who stood up against the scum, the cunts, 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:26.839 the dogs, the filth, the shit. 0:06:27.680 --> 0:06:30.000 Here is a man who stood up. 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:38.440 Martin Scorsese twitched in the cutting room. It had been 0:06:38.520 --> 0:06:42.880 days since he'd slept insomnia, just like the lead character, 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:47.120 Travis Bickle, the revenge minded, lonesome cavey motoring Scorsese's first 0:06:47.160 --> 0:06:51.640 studio film, Taxi Driver. Things have been easier on the 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:56.400 director's last film, Mean Streets. There was no studio, Thus 0:06:56.720 --> 0:07:02.200 little oversight. Taxi Driver was a different East Columbia Pictures 0:07:02.240 --> 0:07:05.320 ponied up nearly two million dollars. It might have been 0:07:05.360 --> 0:07:08.120 the director's vision, but it was their money, and they 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:11.680 wanted to return on that money, and they weren't fucking around. 0:07:13.080 --> 0:07:17.000 And that's why Scorsese couldn't sleep. He needed this final 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:20.800 scene of the film to be perfect. The normally kinetic, 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:26.120 fast talking East Coast director sat Stone still quietly observing. 0:07:25.680 --> 0:07:27.240 The action on the projected picture. 0:07:28.080 --> 0:07:31.480 A young Robert de Niro mohawked and shaved for battle, 0:07:32.760 --> 0:07:35.720 Creeping through the crime and grime of seventies New York 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:39.640 City into the climactic scene as the taxi driver character, 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:47.920 Travis Bickle. Travis walked with purpose from the taxi cab 0:07:47.960 --> 0:07:51.520 to the front stoop. That purpose had been missing from 0:07:51.520 --> 0:07:55.400 his gait in the earlier scenes. This was the climax, 0:07:56.000 --> 0:07:59.600 This was the moment the character was building toward all along. 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:04.840 Finally something for him to do, something big. He was 0:08:04.880 --> 0:08:07.800 going to rescue the little girl and kill anyone who 0:08:07.840 --> 0:08:10.920 got in his way, even if it meant dying himself. 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:15.160 Dying would be a bonus. Actually, what did this life 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:19.880 given him? Anyway, nothing but loneliness and rage, rejection at 0:08:19.920 --> 0:08:23.560 every turn, an extreme inability to relate to anyone or 0:08:23.640 --> 0:08:26.240 anything except for the needs of a helpless little twelve 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:29.400 and a half year old girl turned into a prostitute 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:33.960 by this scum of the earth. Pimp Matthew aka Sport. 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:36.560 Sport got it first. 0:08:37.080 --> 0:08:38.600 At close range. 0:08:38.640 --> 0:08:40.920 Travis shot him on the street outside the brothel with 0:08:40.920 --> 0:08:44.560 his stub nosed thirty eight. Travis then stormed inside and 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:47.599 confronted the pimps bagman, who collected the cash from the 0:08:47.679 --> 0:08:52.080 Johns outside the disgusting smelling room where Iris supplied her trade. 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:56.000 Travis took aim and fired, this time with the heavy artillery, 0:08:56.400 --> 0:08:59.880 with the forty four magnum the Elephant Killer. But the 0:09:00.280 --> 0:09:03.680 man was no elephant. The bagman raised his hand in defense, 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.440 the bullet blasted off four of his five fingers. Blood 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:12.120 splattered everywhere all over the brothels hallway, all over Travis's face. 0:09:13.000 --> 0:09:17.600 Just then another gunshot, this one from behind Travis from Sport, 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:20.679 who somehow survived the close range bullet from the thirty 0:09:20.720 --> 0:09:23.440 eight and made his way into the brothel after Travis. 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:25.640 The bullet grazed Travis's neck. 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:26.559 The motelod. 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:30.600 Travis took game with his forty four blasted Sport away 0:09:30.960 --> 0:09:34.280 and then stumbled in a daze toward Iris. In that room, 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:38.840 Iris was the only thing that mattered, saving her, delivering 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:42.160 her from this hellscape of a city, avenging the sins 0:09:42.160 --> 0:09:44.760 that had been carried out against her, the defiling of 0:09:44.800 --> 0:09:48.120 this innocent young girl by predators. She was powerless against 0:09:49.640 --> 0:09:54.960 that dynamic resonated with Travis. He too was powerless. His innocence, too, 0:09:55.080 --> 0:09:58.960 had been stripped away by forces he couldn't control. Iris 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:00.960 Iris Iris. 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:03.760 Travis put two more bullets into Sport for. 0:10:03.840 --> 0:10:06.480 Insurance, and another into the bagman before making his way 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.920 to Iris's room. Then the John emerged into the hallway 0:10:10.920 --> 0:10:14.160 and caught Travis off guard, firing a bullet into his arm. 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:17.800 Tavisong loaded a full round into the John, at least 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:21.120 three bullets in the face, more to the torso blood 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:24.479 spewed red and hot from the John's cheeks and his chest. 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:28.200 The John fell backward into Iris's room, and there she was. 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.439 She screamed in horror at the dead man, who had 0:10:31.480 --> 0:10:34.560 just collapsed on the floor. Travis moved toward her, but 0:10:34.600 --> 0:10:36.520 now the bagman was on his feet and on top 0:10:36.559 --> 0:10:41.280 of Travis, on his back, actually screaming, ignoring him. Travis 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:44.360 continued to march toward Iris. Iris was all that mattered. 0:10:44.520 --> 0:10:47.199 Iris was all there was, and the bagman managed to 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:50.520 tackle Travis to the ground. In the tussle, Travis stabbed 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:54.320 him through his hand. Screams filled the whorehouse. Travis grabbed 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:56.560 the dead John's gun lying on the floor, and shot 0:10:56.640 --> 0:11:00.120 the screaming bagman through his face, exiting his brains to 0:11:00.160 --> 0:11:04.000 the wall next to Iris, who was by this point hysterical. 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:10.760 Travis's job was done. He'd freed Iris, avenged her stolen innocence, 0:11:11.120 --> 0:11:14.840 and by extension, his too. He put the gun to 0:11:14.880 --> 0:11:19.240 the bottom of his chin and pulled the trigger. The 0:11:19.360 --> 0:11:27.679 chamber was empty. The scene was perfect. It was as 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:30.480 violent a scene as a Hollywood studio had ever produced, 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:34.640 except the movie hadn't yet been fully produced. It was 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.640 still being edited, and the studio had yet to approve 0:11:37.679 --> 0:11:41.880 the final cut. Three characters were killed in this fictional scene, 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:45.000 and this scene was about to result in. 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:46.440 A very real death. 0:11:49.120 --> 0:11:53.480 Martin Scorsese sat pensively in his Mohome apartment high above Hollywood. 0:11:53.880 --> 0:11:58.120 The location had been prescribed by doctor's orders. Scorsese's asthma 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:00.520 was so bad that his physician required him to live 0:12:00.600 --> 0:12:05.040 above the LA's smog line. Hollywood the only city in 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:07.680 the world where this New York director could gain access 0:12:07.720 --> 0:12:10.199 to the resources needed to direct the kind of personal 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:12.960 pictures he wanted to direct, on the same scale as 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:16.280 the greats he admired who came before him, Howard Hawks, 0:12:16.360 --> 0:12:20.800 john Ford, Vincent Minelli. This city was literally choking him 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:24.760 to death. And if it wasn't the city itself, it 0:12:24.880 --> 0:12:28.120 was the studio. Scorsese had just returned from screening his 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:31.720 final cut of Taxi Driver for Columbia Studio executive Stanley Jaffey. 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:34.959 Jaffey hated it too. 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:37.440 Violent, and there was no way, in his estimation, the 0:12:37.480 --> 0:12:39.800 Taxi Driver would be granted an R rating from the 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:43.880 Motion Picture Association of America. With the way Scorsese had 0:12:43.920 --> 0:12:47.680 constructed the final scene, an X rating was almost certain, 0:12:48.200 --> 0:12:51.000 and an X rating meant a major reduction in revenue, 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:55.600 So from the studio executive's perspective, there was only one option. 0:12:56.640 --> 0:12:59.720 He demanded Martin Scorsese re edit the end of Taxi 0:12:59.760 --> 0:13:02.360 Driver to make it less violent in order to garner 0:13:02.360 --> 0:13:07.160 a more favorable rating from the MPAA. In the meeting, 0:13:07.240 --> 0:13:11.520 Scorsese said nothing. The rage inside him shocked him silent. 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:15.640 Who was this guy to tell him how to cut 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:20.560 his movie. His criticism wasn't reserved only for the end either. 0:13:21.040 --> 0:13:25.160 The executive Jaffey, wanted Scorsese to lose the so called 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:28.040 artsy shots of Travis and of New York City from 0:13:28.120 --> 0:13:31.400 earlier in the film as well, claiming they were disrupting 0:13:31.440 --> 0:13:34.120 the momentum and that audiences weren't going to flock to 0:13:34.160 --> 0:13:36.400 the theaters on mass to see a student art film. 0:13:36.720 --> 0:13:40.480 They wanted action, They wanted Charles Bronson blasting away bad guys, 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:43.040 and as many scenes as possible and death wish but 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:45.240 you know, not as violent as the ending of Taxi 0:13:45.320 --> 0:13:46.920 Driver that Scorsese was suggesting. 0:13:48.080 --> 0:13:50.679 Audiences, according to the executive. 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:55.480 Wanted action. They didn't want Gadar and Antonioni. Scorsese realized 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:58.800 he was now taking orders from a philistine. It wasn't 0:13:58.840 --> 0:14:04.280 worth the argument. So now Eerie sat in his apartment 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:08.440 pondering what to do. His rising headache made it nearly 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:12.880 impossible to concentrate on finding a solution. He scanned the room. 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.240 The script pages were scattered across the coffee table. The 0:14:16.320 --> 0:14:19.080 typewriter housed a sheet of paper covered with the filmmaker's 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:23.240 manic ramblings, all caps, no spaces, and there were empty 0:14:23.280 --> 0:14:26.560 pill bottles half full open bottles of wine. A television 0:14:26.560 --> 0:14:29.040 on in the corner in a circle of John's. 0:14:28.720 --> 0:14:30.080 Keeping watch over the apartment. 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:34.600 On the TV John Ford's The Searcher showed John Wayne's 0:14:34.600 --> 0:14:38.800 Ethan Edwards character seeking revenge on the wall, a movie 0:14:38.800 --> 0:14:43.440 poster John Houston's classic Tale of Vengeance Moby Dick. Then 0:14:43.440 --> 0:14:48.280 on the TV table Scorsese's forty four Magnum, an exact 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:52.680 replica weapon of choice of his revenge fueled character Travis Bickle. 0:14:54.520 --> 0:14:59.680 Scorsese picked up the gun and then picked up the phone. 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:06.960 H Scorsese's friend, the young director Stephen Spielberg, fresh off 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:10.760 the release of his Perfect Studio produced box office smash Jaws, 0:15:11.160 --> 0:15:13.560 ignored the phone and focused on the book he was reading, 0:15:14.120 --> 0:15:17.440 Jacques Valais, The Invisible College. What a group of scientists 0:15:17.480 --> 0:15:22.120 has discovered about UFO influence on the human race. Another 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:26.080 of Scorsese's friends, another director, Brian de Palma, the man 0:15:26.120 --> 0:15:29.920 responsible for introducing Scorsese to Robert de Niro, He too 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:33.360 ignored the ringing telephone on his nightstand, surrounded by notes 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:36.720 with angry messages from a nerdy horror author up in Maine. 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:41.800 De Palma ignored those messages just as he ignored his phone. Instead, 0:15:42.240 --> 0:15:44.600 he rolled over to focus on the naked beach blanket 0:15:44.640 --> 0:15:48.680 hippie blonde in his bed. The phone director John Millius's 0:15:48.720 --> 0:15:52.040 place went unanswered as well. John had other things to do, 0:15:52.600 --> 0:15:54.680 like pack for his trip to the Philippines, where the 0:15:54.680 --> 0:15:58.360 film he'd written, Apocalypse Now for friend Francis fort Coppola 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:01.880 was in production. Word it was, it was a disaster. 0:16:02.520 --> 0:16:05.240 And over at Paul Schrader's place, as Paul. 0:16:05.120 --> 0:16:08.880 Cleaned his own gun, he too ignored his phone, except 0:16:08.920 --> 0:16:11.480 Paul knew it was his friend Marty calling with more 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:14.480 bad news about the taxi driver's script that Paul himself 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:17.640 had written, which Scorsese was having a hard time finishing. 0:16:19.520 --> 0:16:22.240 Paul Schrader was as pissed off as John Millius was 0:16:22.280 --> 0:16:24.800 in a rush, as Brian to Palmer was indifferent, as 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:30.600 Steven Spielberg was distracted. But Martin Scorsese was determined, so 0:16:30.680 --> 0:16:34.080 he kept calling, and the phones kept ringing until one 0:16:34.280 --> 0:16:36.640 and then all of his friends heard the distraught states 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:38.720 Scorsese was in. On the other end of the line. 0:16:39.640 --> 0:16:42.960 He was like nothing they'd ever heard before. Even for 0:16:43.040 --> 0:16:46.520 the notoriously high strung Scorsese, this state he was in 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:50.520 was serious. Marty was as sleep deprived as Travis Bickle 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:53.480 and on twice as many pills. His anger was as 0:16:53.520 --> 0:16:56.280 palpable as the La smog on a scorching summer day. 0:16:56.640 --> 0:16:59.280 He was rambling like a madman, talking twice as fast 0:16:59.320 --> 0:17:02.360 as normal, something about the cocksuck studio, fuck with the 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:06.760 ricotta cheese for brains, How the Solas automaton didn't want violence, Well, 0:17:06.800 --> 0:17:09.280 then how would he deal with this kind of violence, 0:17:09.480 --> 0:17:12.320 the kind that drove a young promising director to blasting 0:17:12.320 --> 0:17:14.640 his own brains all over the walls of his apartment. 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:19.879 They all moved with sudden urgency into their cars, racing 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:22.200 through the streets of Hollywood up into the dead man 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:25.880 curves of Mahall, nearly killing themselves in the process. One 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:29.760 by one, all four directors wheeled into Scorsese's driveway at 0:17:29.800 --> 0:17:33.040 the same time, exited their cars, raced to the locked 0:17:33.080 --> 0:17:36.560 front door, tried pushing it open, banged on it, profusely 0:17:36.880 --> 0:17:40.080 rang the doorbell, readied themselves to batter ram it down 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:41.840 with all of their combined force. 0:17:42.280 --> 0:17:42.960 And then. 0:18:11.119 --> 0:18:15.600 The massive shotgun blast rang. In the New Year, January first, 0:18:15.920 --> 0:18:20.080 nineteen seventy two, three years earlier, the shotgun was a 0:18:20.119 --> 0:18:24.119 substitute for fireworks. John Millius stood on the porsch of 0:18:24.160 --> 0:18:27.200 Margo Kitders Nicholas Beach a frame and fired his gun 0:18:27.240 --> 0:18:31.320 out over the Pacific Ocean. None of Margot's guests were shocked, 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:37.040 especially not Margot's boyfriend Brian de Palma. Guns were always around, 0:18:37.520 --> 0:18:40.320 and why wouldn't they be John Millius, who had written 0:18:40.320 --> 0:18:42.960 the script for Apocalypse Now, and to Palma, who had 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:46.840 written the excellent Hitchcock style thriller Sisters starring kidder In 0:18:46.920 --> 0:18:50.600 her housemate Jennifer Salt, and Steven Spielberg, who was also 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:53.160 milling about the New Year's Day party he'd just released 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:57.040 the excellent thriller Duel for television. And Paul Schrader, at 0:18:57.040 --> 0:18:59.760 the time a subversive film critic, but who was working 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:02.520 on a script about a lonesome, homicidal cab driver. 0:19:03.320 --> 0:19:05.199 All of these filmmakers. 0:19:04.880 --> 0:19:08.920 Were revolutionaries, so yeah, guns were up in the mix. 0:19:09.720 --> 0:19:14.520 Guns were necessary. If not literally then figuratively, what these 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:18.560 filmmakers were endeavoring to do creatively was high stakes by 0:19:18.600 --> 0:19:19.440 any means. 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:20.399 Necessary type stuff. 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:25.760 Their goal, both collectively and individually, was as audacious as 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:29.760 it was dangerous, to make extremely personal movies with the 0:19:29.800 --> 0:19:32.800 backing of the major Hollywood studios, so that they could 0:19:32.880 --> 0:19:37.399 reach as wide an audience as possible. It's not like 0:19:37.440 --> 0:19:40.439 the Hollywood studios hadn't made big budget films that reached 0:19:40.480 --> 0:19:44.520 massive audiences before. Of course they had, but the studios 0:19:44.520 --> 0:19:47.560 had never turned control of those pictures over to a 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:50.200 band of young outsiders who didn't come up as directors 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:54.199 through the studios, who came instead from film schools, and 0:19:54.240 --> 0:19:57.200 who wanted to make movies that expressed their own personal 0:19:57.240 --> 0:20:00.479 experiences and that spoke to the tumultuous time times they 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:03.320 were living through and spoke directly to the young people 0:20:03.359 --> 0:20:08.080 living through those times at that moment. This was before 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:11.879 Spielberg's Jaws and before any real success for any of 0:20:11.880 --> 0:20:15.960 these so called Hollywood brats. This was the early nineteen seventies. 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:18.719 This was a moment in time in Hollywood that had 0:20:18.720 --> 0:20:22.680 never existed before and would never exist again, a time 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:24.840 when the town was still on a contact tie from 0:20:24.840 --> 0:20:28.679 the success of nineteen sixty nine's Easy Rider, an adult 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:32.280 movie written not just about young people, but four young people. 0:20:32.960 --> 0:20:36.679 The film changed the industry. Studio executives were forced to 0:20:36.680 --> 0:20:38.760 reckon with the fact that they were losing money because 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:39.560 the films. 0:20:39.280 --> 0:20:40.800 They were creating were out of touch. 0:20:41.600 --> 0:20:45.960 Therefore, they needed fresh creative perspective from young directors who 0:20:46.000 --> 0:20:49.520 came from outside the studio system, and for the first 0:20:49.520 --> 0:20:53.280 time in Hollywood's history, came from, like I said, film school. 0:20:54.359 --> 0:20:55.440 That's where this group. 0:20:55.240 --> 0:20:58.160 Of young filmmakers came from, and that's why the mood 0:20:58.240 --> 0:21:02.040 was so jubilant. They knew that not only were they revolutionaries, 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:05.320 some of them literally toting guns, they knew that they 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:07.919 had Hollywood by the balls, and it was only a 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:10.920 matter of time before one or all of them broke through. 0:21:10.800 --> 0:21:11.600 In a big way. 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:18.080 The confidence did not, however, extend to Martin Scorsese, who 0:21:18.240 --> 0:21:21.400 was at that moment, sulking on the beach, fully assembled 0:21:21.400 --> 0:21:25.200 and perfectly pressed pants, buttoned up, big collared starch shirt 0:21:25.440 --> 0:21:28.879 and shine shoes, looking as East coast as one could 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:31.879 on a West Coast beach, watching Margo Kidder and her 0:21:31.960 --> 0:21:37.480 equally sexy housemate Jennifer Salt sunbathe in their bikinis. Scorsese's 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:41.240 own girlfriend, Sandy Wintrop, daughter of Warner Brothers studio executive 0:21:41.240 --> 0:21:45.240 Fred Winetrop, didn't seem to mind. She also didn't mind 0:21:45.320 --> 0:21:48.200 being referred to in mean streets as the wine trot 0:21:48.280 --> 0:21:51.120 brought by de Niro's Johnny Boy character. But I digress. 0:21:52.000 --> 0:21:54.920 It was the early seventies, liberation was in the air. 0:21:55.720 --> 0:21:59.320 Scorsese pondered his dilemma. How in the hell was he 0:21:59.720 --> 0:22:02.840 or empty, fast talking Italian kid from New York with 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:05.720 no money gonna make the types of movies he wanted 0:22:05.760 --> 0:22:09.879 to make movies that reflected the violence, spiritual confusion, and 0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:13.240 sexual frustration he'd experienced back in New York City's Little 0:22:13.280 --> 0:22:16.440 Italy neighborhood where he grew up amid real life gangsters 0:22:16.480 --> 0:22:20.399 and godlike priests. How is that possible in the town 0:22:20.600 --> 0:22:23.600 like this, where the sun and the smog and the 0:22:23.680 --> 0:22:27.159 smiles and the shit talk comed along an incessant contradiction. 0:22:28.520 --> 0:22:32.280 How had he ended up here? Him Martin Scorsese, a 0:22:32.359 --> 0:22:36.280 tailor's son on a god forsaken beach with a studio 0:22:36.320 --> 0:22:39.320 boss's daughter, as a girlfriend and ambition as big as 0:22:39.320 --> 0:22:42.440 the Pacific Ocean staring back at him, threatening to swallow 0:22:42.520 --> 0:22:46.199 him whole. He did not have an answer, but at 0:22:46.280 --> 0:22:51.240 least he had friends. Steven Spielberg stopped by SCORSESEI on 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:53.120 the beach on his way into the water and asked 0:22:53.160 --> 0:22:53.480 him if. 0:22:53.440 --> 0:22:55.720 He wanted to join him for a dip. Come on, 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:56.959 let's go in the ocean. 0:22:57.080 --> 0:23:01.160 Spielberg directed, no, no, no, it's very it's evil. There's 0:23:01.200 --> 0:23:02.560 things out there you don't even want to know about. 0:23:02.680 --> 0:23:07.159 Scorsese replied, are you afraid of jellyfish? There's no jellyfish 0:23:07.160 --> 0:23:10.280 out there? Spielberg responded, no, no. 0:23:10.080 --> 0:23:11.119 No, things with teeth. 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:15.760 Spielberg gave up and moved toward the water. His imagination 0:23:16.000 --> 0:23:25.520 burned like the hot sand beneath his feet. Interior, Martin 0:23:25.560 --> 0:23:30.520 Scorsese's apartment night. We fast forward into nineteen seventy five, 0:23:30.600 --> 0:23:34.000 to the night of Back, to the moment before our hero, 0:23:34.080 --> 0:23:37.320 Martin Scorsese loses it and decides to call on his 0:23:37.359 --> 0:23:40.679 friends to come save him. The camera shows a close, 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:43.159 full body profile shot of our hero sitting in a 0:23:43.160 --> 0:23:46.280 comfortable chair just a few feet from a small television 0:23:46.320 --> 0:23:49.439 on a small television stand. His leg extends out with 0:23:49.480 --> 0:23:53.280 his cowboy boot perched on the television. He carefully extends 0:23:53.320 --> 0:23:56.680 pressure from his foot to slowly rock the TV back 0:23:56.680 --> 0:23:59.560 and forth on its stand. We see that he is 0:23:59.600 --> 0:24:03.000 stowing and holding a massive black forty four magnum pistol 0:24:03.040 --> 0:24:05.960 in his hand. Resting in his lap is a half 0:24:06.000 --> 0:24:08.440 empty jar of peanut butter that our hero eats out 0:24:08.440 --> 0:24:11.320 of for a spoon. The television plays an old black 0:24:11.359 --> 0:24:15.520 and white film, Stanley Kubrick's The Killing from nineteen fifty six. 0:24:16.480 --> 0:24:19.440 Our hero stares at the action on the screen, still 0:24:19.560 --> 0:24:22.919 carefully pressing his foot against the television, causing it to 0:24:23.000 --> 0:24:26.800 teeter ever so slightly, before returning upright, daring it to 0:24:26.840 --> 0:24:31.720 tip over on the television. Character actor Timothy Carey, one 0:24:31.720 --> 0:24:34.720 of Hollywood's great bad guys, leaves his hideout with his 0:24:34.840 --> 0:24:38.120 rifle concealed in a guitar case, and then speeds away 0:24:38.160 --> 0:24:40.879 off to the racetrack to pull a job. He posts 0:24:40.960 --> 0:24:42.920 up away from the track with a clear sight line 0:24:42.960 --> 0:24:45.760 to his mark, the thoroughbred racehorse that he must keep 0:24:45.760 --> 0:24:51.560 from winning, that he must kill. It occurs to our 0:24:51.600 --> 0:24:55.240 hero Martin Scorsese in that moment that the studios are 0:24:55.280 --> 0:24:58.680 like the great Thoroughbreds in Kubrick's film, racing down the Stretch, 0:24:59.400 --> 0:25:03.359 these big bohemus lumbering through our culture, winning and losing 0:25:03.359 --> 0:25:06.600 an equal measure with the highest of stakes being ridden 0:25:06.680 --> 0:25:10.240 hard by their studio executives, stampeding over the souls of 0:25:10.280 --> 0:25:15.040 some of our greatest creative minds. Scorsese feels a tinge 0:25:15.080 --> 0:25:18.560 of rage. He presses harder against the television with his foot, 0:25:18.920 --> 0:25:21.880