American Riviera Award 2012: Martin Scorsese

Reviewed by Tyler Rowland.  Experienced at the Arlington Theatre during the Santa Barbara Film Festival 2012.

Martin Scorsese.  The man, the myth, the legend.  All expectations were exceeded during this tribute to the cinematic genius.  This was entertainment that could have been appreciated by anyone and was not limited to film buffs or even avid followers of Scorcese’s work over the years.

The presence of moderator Leonard Maltin (film critic and historian) was appreciated but essentially ballast as he seemed to be awestruck in the presence of Mr. Scorsese.  He mentioned how the illustrious careers of John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Frank Capra were remarkable, but trailed off toward the end.  This fate is not bestowing of Mr. Scorsese, as he has been going strong for nearly half a century and shows no signs of slowing down.  Just a simple reminder of how he matched up with the some of the all-time great directors in cinematic history.  A brief montage was shown that spanned his entire career, and for those who follow Mr. Scorsese’s work, it broadly summed up over 40 years of filmmaking in less than five minutes.

Scorsese’s charismatic personality held the attention of packed 2,000 seat Arlington Theatre for well over two hours.

He quickly spanned some memorable highlights of his life, mixing in some behind the scenes information from self-chosen clips of his favorite films.  The focus was always shifted from the aesthetics to a comedic aspect, such as the back and forth dialogue, mostly improvised, between Harvey Keitel and Robert DeNiro in Mean Streets (1973), the mirror scene in Taxi Driver (1975), a hilarious unscripted take of his parents in ItalianAmerican (1976), a look inside the ropes on Raging Bull (1980), the infamous long take in Goodfellas (1992), and a visual disposition of his latest 3-D masterpiece Hugo (2011).

In between clips, he reminisced about his life.  From his early childhood experiences going to the movies up until the recent past and why he made Hugo.  Cinematic decisiveness as to the reasoning of filming Raging Bull in black and white, as opposed to the sub-par color film stock of the day and the quick overview of Joe Pesci’s “Am I funny” improvisation on the set of Goodfellas were delightfully entertaining and humorous.  His anecdotes were always on cue but were never even necessary.  This includes the tales of how he lost a cufflink while filming Woodstock (1969) and how he bought his first pair of jeans (his first pair of pants that were not dress slacks) and shot Mean Streets in them.

Mr. Scorsese’s appreciation for music was also discussed.  We saw a clip from his film The Last Waltz (1978) which exposed the raw emotion brought out with the live rendition of Mannish Boy, performed by the epic Muddy Waters.  A brief glance at Bob Dylan in No Direction Home (2005) shows the innocent contempt against the system by exposing smart and savvy creativity of the artist.

As much of a celebrity that Mr. Scorsese is, he never fails to give credit where it is due.  His influences reach far back into the earliest days of cinema, citing films from George Melies and the Lumiere brothers.

This unforgettable night was capped by the presentation of the award by the legendary Sir Ben Kingsley who gave an incredible tribute speech from his heart, not something read from a monitor.  I am not 100 percent on this, but it looked as though Sir Ben tugged on some heartstrings of Mr. Scorsese, showing the audience that this almost mythological director is indeed human.

A big thank you to Roger Durling, without his persistence over the years this night would not have been possible.