By now, you’ve heard that Martin Scorsese is afraid of emails. “They scare me,†he told the Associated Press. “It says CC and there are a thousand names. Who are these people?†I wonder if he’ll feel the same way about his 200,000-plus Letterboxd followers he’s amassed on his new account since it went active in the past 24 hours.
Scorsese is not new to “being online†— his 23-year-old daughter Francesca has frequently featured him on her TikTok, and he has an Instagram account that shares both press stills and vacation photos. “find me on @letterboxd,†his latest post reads in a lowercase caption — a sign of the terminally online — his (or his social-media manager’s) own. And Scorsese is not the first director to show up on Letterboxd. Sean Baker has been there for a long time, as well as Christopher McQuarrie and Jim Cummings, but Scorsese might be the first to use it in the promotion of his own movie. Killers of the Flower Moon, out now, stars arguably two of the most famous actors in the world — Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro — and features one of the most memorable, moving performances from breakout star Lily Gladstone.
Typically, Scorsese would do a profile or two but leave most of the banter to the actors, who are unable to promote their films on account of the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, preventing them (perhaps to their relief) from yukking it up on late-night talk shows. While Gladstone is putting her face out there, she’s doing so on the SAG picket line. As the SAG strike continues — 104 days in, with no sign of delay for awards season — directors have become the default mascots for their films. So it’s all on Scorsese himself, or his Letterboxd profile.
It helps, of course, that Scorsese is really good at this. His Letterboxd does not debase itself with contemporary references, nor does it say Bottoms is the movie we need right now. He’s crafted an extensive list of companion films to his own work and highlighted his work with the Film Foundation. His descriptions are detailed and enthusiastic; it’s hard for even skeptics to discount the sheer pleasure of reading (and listening) to Scorsese talk about other people’s films. He’s promoting his work on his own terms as best he can, knowing, of course, that an Academy that prefers the buzzy, vibrant work of A24 films might need a bit of courting to see his three-hour-plus genocidal epic.
Still, there is a bizarre cognitive dissonance to Scorsese’s internet presence: Though always charming and articulate, it does feel odd to peddle out this cute old man as the face of his movie, a searing indictment of Manifest Destiny and white colonial violence. In the context of Killers of the Flower Moon’s content — its violence and brutal tone — every subsequent Scorsese TikTok or post feels like a pastel-colored Instagram infographic to share on your Story but otherwise ignore the context of. It’s not dissimilar from the way in which Christopher Nolan subjected himself to TikTok content about Oppenheimer. These are titans of an industry whom we consider, perhaps, “above this whole thing†— Nolan doesn’t even use a cell phone! And the films in question are weighty features, ones that grapple with humanity’s propensity for violence, selfishness, and revenge. Next up: David Fincher in a BuzzFeed puppy interview.
With the news that Killers of the Flower Moon is second in the box office to Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour and courting an audience consisting of almost half under-35s, maybe the strategy is working. It’s not like anyone gets sick of seeing Marty, especially when it’s through the eyes of his daughter, who undoubtedly knows and loves him in a way that not even film bros do. The best-case scenario is that Scorsese’s Letterboxd will introduce the site’s users to several new-to-them films that might enrich their own understanding of his work and get them curious about older, international films he’s worked to restore over the years. Don’t be surprised if you see other Academy members and hopefuls — Yorgos Lanthimos, maybe — hopping on TikTok or Letterboxd.