Film, podcasts and gaming are adopting the look and feel of television. Is this imitation robbing us of distinctive modes of storytelling?
Two lines of questioning have bubbled up around the promotional campaign for The Irishman. The first is: “Is
Netflix destroying cinema?” and the second, thanks to an offhand mid-interview remark by the film’s director Martin Scorsese that refuses to go away, is: “Is Marvel destroying cinema?” The answer to both, of course, is yes. But Netflix and Marvel are not destroying cinema due to a reduction in theatrical screenings or a lack of artistry or anything like that. They are destroying cinema because they both really, really want to be television.
The Irishman, for example, is three-and-a-half hours long. That’s far longer than any sensible person is willing to endure in a cinema, with the cramped legroom and the peripheral texters and the inevitable mid-point toilet shuffle. But watch it in the comfort of your own home and it immediately becomes much more desirable. Not least because, for those of us who only have a limited time each day when their living rooms aren’t being dominated by Paw Patrol, its epic decades-spanning story of a truck driver-turned-hitman-turned-shady union rep is episodic enough to be watched in chunks. The Irishman is a miniseries disguised as a film.