Martin Scorsese was greeted by loud cheers as he alighted from his car at the Berlinale Palast on Tuesday night, and set about signing autographs for the crowd gathered on this cold Berlin night.
The Oscar-winning filmmaker is the recipient of an honorary Golden Bear for lifetime achievement at the 74th Berlinale.
“Marty!! Marty!!” the crowd chanted, as Scorsese posed for photographers before fielding press questions and greeting festival brass, protected from the sharp weather only by his dapper black suit.
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Once inside the auditorium, the 81-year-old finally sat down some 25 minutes after arriving, following a long-standing ovation.
Live music from the soundtrack of Killers of the Flowers Moon was accompanied by clips playing on the screen. The fest’s exec director, Marietta Rissenbeek, and artistic director, Carlo Chatrian, offered a few words in recognition of the great director, making Scorsese laugh and seem to all but cry with his daughter Francesca by his side.
German director Wim Wenders took to the stage and gave an overview of his career, rolling off scores of titles from Scorsese’s seven decades of filmmaking, talking about the career that the self-effacing Scorsese later said on stage he could not do himself. “I just can’t,” he said.
“Directed by Martin Scorsese. For half of a century now this has become a trademark and a brand. Half a century of an extraordinary cinematic journey,” said Wenders, before recalling his first meeting with Scorsese on a lonely Utah road in 1978, following the Telluride Film Festival when, he said, Scorsese emerged from under a car with a flat tire he was trying to fix on a drive with Isabella Rossellini.
Wenders also applauded Scorsese’s The Film Foundation as “a Noah’s Ark for film heritage, it has helped to restore over 1,000 films and make them accessible to the public. Returning to cinema what it gave you,” he said.
When Scorsese finally took to the stage to receive his award, he thanked “everyone in Berlin” before adding a personal note of gratitude for Wenders. “Wim, I don’t know what to say after such an introduction and beautiful history of the work I’ve done over the years, and of my collaborators. It’s a hard act to follow.”
Scorsese continued the Telluride tale of film talent meetings that day in 1978 and talked up Wenders’ work almost as much as Wenders had his, showing his generosity towards others and encyclopedic knowledge of cinema.
“As far as my own films, I don’t know what I can say about 50 and 60 years of work, I can’t do it without talking about the place film is celebrated which is festivals,” Scorsese said. “I really feel blessed to have been part of the conversation for most of my life. I cannot talk about my work. Maybe Wim can.”
No stranger to the Berlinale, many of Scorsese’s films have played here, including Raging Bull, which played out of competition in 1981, Cape Fear which screened in Competition in 1992. Gangs of New York, which played out of competition in 2003, and Shutter Island playing out of competition in 2010. His Rolling Stones concert film Shine a Light opened the Berlinale in 2008.
Scorsese’s Film Foundation has been involved in several films shown in the Berlinale Classics section over the years.
“For The Film Foundation initially we looked for films that influenced us. We would look for copies (of old films) but it was very hard to find good copies,” Scorsese told journalists on Tuesday, before the ceremony. “There was a mystique about the film including who the people were that made the film so there was this magic in discovering something new in art and cinema as art. It could be a John Ford film or anyone from Satyajit Ray…”
Scorsese confirmed to reporters in Berlin that he is working on a film on the life of Christ.
“I’m contemplating it right now. What kind of film, I’m not quite sure. But I want to make something unique and different that could be thought-provoking and, I hope, also entertaining. I’m not quite sure yet how to go about it,” he told reporters.
Previous Golden Bear lifetime achievement award winners include Steven Spielberg, Helen Mirren and Ian McKellen, as well as Wenders.
Killers of the Flower Moon has been nominated for 10 Oscars, including best picture. Following the Berlinale ceremony, the festival screened Scorsese’s 2006 Oscar-winner The Departed.
