Movie
Martin Scorsese on Indigenous Peoples and the Prairies
Martin Scorsese, director and co-writer of “Killers of the Flower Moon,” at the film’s premiere in Los Angeles. photo
© Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP/dpa
The 80-year-old star director has dealt intensively with the indigenous Osage people. His film “Killers of the Flower Moon” hits theaters this week.
The film, based on true events, centers on the Osage indigenous people who were victims of a crime in 1920s Oklahoma. Members of the tribe were systematically murdered by white Americans after oil was discovered on their land.
The director says he is fascinated by dealing with the history of indigenous people respectfully, with dignity and truthfully. In Oklahoma, where the film was also shot, he met with tribal people and the paramount chief Standing Bear. “Of course they were very careful,” Scorsese says of their first encounter.
A beautiful place becomes gloomy
In addition, as a native New Yorker, he was “very urban” and knew little about nature. But the vast prairie, with wild horses and bison, opens “minds and hearts.” Such a beautiful place became a dark place back then, says Scorsese. The template for the Apple production is a book by journalist David Grann about an FBI officer who is investigating the brutal series of murders.
Leonardo DiCaprio (48) was initially supposed to play the official, but then Scorsese came up with a different idea. Instead of looking at the problem from the outside, he and “Forrest Gump” writer Eric Roth rewrote the script, with DiCaprio as Osage woman Mollie’s (Lily Gladstone) husband Ernest and a greater focus on the indigenous perspective. Robert De Niro plays Ernest’s uncle – he is an influential rancher who poses as a friend of the Osage, but is greedy after their oil rights.
The actors learned the Osage language for the shoot. De Niro really fell in love with the language and wanted to shoot more scenes in it, says Scorsese. “He just liked the sound.”
“Killers of the Flower Moon” is Scorsese and De Niro’s tenth feature film together, following classics such as “Taxi Driver”, “Raging Bull” and “The Irishman”. They knew each other as teenagers, says Scorsese – “we trust each other.” De Niro also made him aware of DiCaprio early on. “You should work with this kid,” De Niro advised him, who had filmed the family drama “This Boy’s Life” with the young, still unknown DiCaprio in 1993. Scorsese later took this to heart. After “Gangs of New York (2002), “Aviator”, “Departed”, “Shutter Island” and “The Wolf of Wall Street”, this is their sixth collaboration.
– Killers of the Flower Moon, USA 2023, 206 min., FSK from 12, by Martin Scorsese, with Lily Gladstone, Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio.