Listen Here: A Martin Scorsese Radio Interview from 1970

Martin Scorsese, born on this date in 1942, is, of course, one of the most important filmmakers in the world. There’s very little we can add to his well deserved esteem as a director and technical innovator of the first order.

In addition to all of this, he has become well known as an advocate for great film, for exhibition, education and restoration. Through his work as Founder and Chair of the non-profit Film Foundation he endeavors to raise the profile of films through preservation and exhibition programs.
The Film Foundation’s restoration, personally supervised by Scorsese, of Marlon Brando’s only directorial credit ONE EYED JACKS (1961) will be screened by AFS at the State Theatre in Austin on Monday, Dec. 5.

This side of Scorsese, the tireless advocate, the champion of great movies and filmmakers, is not new. Below is an interview conducted in 1970 with the then-27 year old Scorsese who, at the time, had only one feature directorial credit under his belt, 1967’s WHO’S THAT KNOCKING AT MY DOOR. At the time of this WNYC interview he was curating the Movies In The Park series in Manhattan. He talks a bit about the program, about the way film became a democratic art as soon as the means of production became cheap, easy and quick enough for the average person, and there are interesting detours into the contemporaneous state of film education.

It’s only a 22 minute interview, but as is customary with Scorsese, he fits at least an hour worth of words in with his machine-gun delivery. Enjoy.

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