Scorsese is a prestigious American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film
historian. He has worked with some of the best films to date like Goodfellas,
Taxi Driver and Mean Streets. The films that he has worked on have all been
very influential and inspirational pieces that have gone on to make some of the
directors today.
Being so successful in his line of work he
created a trademark for his work that expressed his style of directing. For
example Martin Scorsese would begin his films with a segment taken from the
middle or end to make the film more indulging and entertaining for the viewers.
Also he introduced the stepping-stones for special effects to be accepted and
used in a wider spectrum of the media industry by including slow motion
entwined with certain shots, which was revolutionary in cinematography. One of Scorsese’s editing styles would involve pausing
the frame during the middle of an action packed frame and have a voice over of
the first person narrative in connection to the certain scenario. Another very
clever editing technique is the flash-bulb cuts that help change the scene and
atmosphere of the setting that help a wipe to happen as well. Many of his techniques
has been used and adapted through the years to this very day as Andy Wachowski has used numerous of these techniques
in The Matrix as he would speed up and slow down many action shots while a fight
would break out which is the same method Scorsese would use to capture the fast
paced action taking place.
A well known shoot out
scene in The Departed was captured perfectly as different techniques and camera
angles were used to get every aspect of the characters in the story, making
sure each part of the situation is clear to the audience. During the first set
of shots fired the camera swiftly turns as if it was a first person shot of
someone turning their head, creating the rapid feel of the battle amongst the
cops and villains. He uses quick cuts during the scene so you only really hear
the gun being fired and the end result of someone dying. He also captures a
birds-eye shot of someone firing the gun towards the camera as they fall back
from a shot, involving the viewer in the shootout, making them feel like they
are their. There is a juxtaposition between the cops and the robbers involving
the shots fired as when ever there is a close-up of the shot fired by the
police it shows the pinnacle of the criminals as the shot focuses on them
getting shot. This expresses the contrast in good and bad and good winning and
overriding the bad guys in which they gun them down. As you only see the two
sides in the in a close-up of each individual Scorsese uses shot-reverse shot
of them firing at each other. Then the final scene he uses a crosscutting
technique to show Jack Nicholson’s reaction as he makes an escape away from the
rivalry.
