I'm marinating on it. It's good, but I wasn't blown away. Maybe coming late "in the game" to watch the movie and seeing all the glowing reviews made unrealistic expectations.
Also, a little tangent here, but why does Scorsese always get a pass with his constant use of voice-over narration?? Its a easy way to convey necessary information to the audience outside the actual content of the film. Don't have to have dialogue between characters or visual cues. I find that technique a bit of a cheat, though.
People give Nolan crap about his exposition, he should just have constant voice-over narration throughout all his movies to appease these critics
sorry what’s that about voiceover
viewing #2 tonight, the last hour hit even harder. What a masterpiece.
The movie is almost comical. Having a deaged De Niro with his old grimaces and a super old body takes me out and it makes the film feel like a parody of gangster films.
It gets better when De Niro plays his age but the movie is so long that by that point it was almost two hours in.
I'm marinating on it. It's good, but I wasn't blown away. Maybe coming late "in the game" to watch the movie and seeing all the glowing reviews made unrealistic expectations.
Also, a little tangent here, but why does Scorsese always get a pass with his constant use of voice-over narration?? Its a easy way to convey necessary information to the audience outside the actual content of the film. Don't have to have dialogue between characters or visual cues. I find that technique a bit of a cheat, though.
People give Nolan crap about his exposition, he should just have constant voice-over narration throughout all his movies to appease these critics
In this case, the through line of voiceover is important as it anchors old-age remorse throughout the film, slowly building up to the last hour of introspection. It’s a framing device that actually frames the film as a continuation of Silence’s late-career rumination, instead of just providing exposition.* There’s also a lot you can pull from the tone of the voiceover – does De Niro sound remorseful? Indifferent? Reliable/unreliable? Those things are up to the viewer’s interpretation, of course, but any one of those options enriches the character.
* My recollection of Goodfellas isn’t too good but Goodfellas’ voiceover (“I always wanted to be a gangster...”) frames the film as a Great American story. Wolf is a whole other story with that famous last scene that reframes the entire movie as a commodified inspirational speech. Age of Innocence does this because the text is beautiful lol, and suggests an omnipresent female understanding of the male psyche. Can’t think of other examples right now, maybe others can add to this.
Last edited by anarchy on December 1st, 2019, 5:35 am, edited 2 times in total.
About voice-over, I agree that Scorsese tend to use it to often in his films. In The Departed, Gangs of New York... it's doesn't bring much. In The age of innocence, which is one of my favourite Scorsese, Joanne Woodward reads parts of the book, but Scorsese isn't able to do this book/film mix as well as Truffaut who was his inspiration.
However, I find it very well done in The Irishman, also because the voice-over disappears for long parts of the film sometimes. I feel in the Irishman you can feel both Sheeran's point of view, and Scorsese's point of view.
I'm confident in saying that The Irishman will be considered one of Scorsese's best films when we reflect many years from now. It's a hell of a companion piece to something like Goodfellas.
Regarding the narration--
in The Irishman specifically, it makes complete sense because he is reflecting on his life by telling his life story to someone--the film never indicates who. Also, comparing narration/voice-over to exposition isn't exactly fair.
Exposition uses language that isn't normal in typical conversation--narration helps to fully explore the psyche of the narrator which enhances the story.
This is gona be a long shot.. but what are the chance they release the pictures taken in the movie? There's a scene at the end when Sheeran is going through old pics, and there is a really good one of him and Russ. I want to get that framed.
The movie is almost comical. Having a deaged De Niro with his old grimaces and a super old body takes me out and it makes the film feel like a parody of gangster films.
It gets better when De Niro plays his age but the movie is so long that by that point it was almost two hours in.
