Martin Scorsese: "At my age, what else can I do but take risks?"

It was a thorn in the side of the Cannes Film Festival. Since 1986, with Jo, ¡qué noche! (which won the award for best director) another film by Martin Scorsese (New York, 80 years), Palme d'Or in 1976 with Taxi Driver, had not been screened in the contest. His Killers of the Flower Moon is one of the events of the festival, and is screened in Special Session because the director and AppleTV+ have refused to participate in the competition. The film, which will have a previous premiere in theaters before reaching the platform, had its gala screening yesterday and today both its director, Martin Scorsese, as well as its cast (Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro and Lily Gladstone) and the chief of the Osage nation (Geoffrey Standing Bear), the Native Americans who suffered the massacre of the title, has appeared at the press conference that had raised more expectations of the festival: even with Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny there was an empty chair, which has not happened this Sunday.

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A torrential Martin Scorsese settles accounts with the original sin of the United States in 'Killers of the Flower Moon'

The meeting has served to testify to DiCaprio's devotion to his director, the respect for the Osage nation that Scorsese wanted to print throughout the production, and things are complicated politically and socially in today's world, according to the filmmaker and De Niro. And for the master director to confess: "At my age, what else can I do but take risks?"

Robert De Niro jokes with photographers before the press conference. GONZALO FUENTES (REUTERS)

On the current state of the world lit the fuse De Niro, which gives life to William King Hale, the man who creates the intricate system to fleece the Osage. In 1870 the Osage were forced by the U.S. government to abandon their lands and placed in the worst corner of Oklahoma. However, in the mid-twenties of the last century oil began to flow in those stony grounds. Suddenly, the tribe started making thousands of dollars and spending it on luxury cars, opulent villas and every whim. Around them the parasitic targets multiplied, who in collusion with the authorities and the forces of order, began first to rob them and then to exterminate them. "It's easier to go to prison for stoning a dog than for killing an Indian," he is heard on screen.

Leonardo DiCaprio, at Sunday's photo shoot. Guillaume Horcajuelo (EFE)

At the top of this pyramid of terror was King Hale, who under his guise as a friend of the tribe hid a guy eager for money, who managed to cheat insurance companies, marry his nephews to Osage women, then murder them and collect their inheritance, or get him to be the beneficiary of the wills of the Indians he ordered murdered. De Niro, who has played all kinds of psychopaths in his career, told reporters: "I don't understand my character, I really don't understand him. Why does he betray his Osage friends? That episode is another confirmation of the systemic racism that we live in the United States, as the death of George Floyd reminded us, and of the banality of evil. Hale is part of the system, which still exists today: you have to stay alert. We see it today and you know who I'm talking about. I'm not going to say his name." Although he immediately blurted out: "Look at Trump! There are people who think he did a good job." To which its director pointed out: "You said it!"

Martin Scorsese, Sunday in Cannes.PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA (AFP)

Scorsese had to talk about the war in Ukraine, and he did not mince words Scorsese. "Of course, I am concerned about Russia's aggression against Ukraine. People forget how World War II began, with the entry of the Nazis into Poland. Or remember what happened in the Balkans." The filmmaker took the opportunity to reflect on the current state of freedoms: "We live in a worse moment than that terrible situation in the thirties. Because today we live a confrontation over freedom, freedom of expression and freedom to lead a decent life. Sometimes life is very hard and we are prevented from living it in peace. It is better to live within Western culture, which has its negative side with consumerism, which places money at the top of the pyramid, but at least supports countries that try to get closer to democracy."

Leonardo Dicaprio, Martin Scorsese and Robert de Niro, at Saturday night's gala session of 'Killers of the Flower Moon'. LOIC VENANCE (AFP)

The screenplay is based on the story The Killers of the Moon, by David Grann (in Spain, published by Penguin Random House), about the real extermination of the Osage. The book better explains a fact that is not clear in the film: the State itself participated in the plundering and declared minors to the Osage through a system by which every time he wanted to spend part of his fortune, they had to ask permission from their white guardian. Grann also says that the Osage first hired private detectives and then turned to the FBI, led by a 28-year-old named John Edgar Hoover.

Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese chat to photographers. LOIC VENANCE (AFP)

Instead, Scorsese has prioritized the Osage nation's point of view through the eyes of Mollie Burkhart (an impressive Lily Gladstone), who married one of Hale's nephews, the mindless Ernest (DiCaprio), a guy as foolish as he was in love with his wife. And yet, he tries to murder her. The actor has said that one of Scorsese's abilities affects his character: "What Marty does incredibly well is build roles as sinister and twisted as possible and give them a human condition." The director explained that it was DiCaprio, who was originally going to play FBI agent Tom White, who questioned him in the writing of the script where the heart of the story was. "After meeting with the Osage nation on several occasions, I promised them that I would make a film that they would be proud of, and I understood that I should focus on Ernest and Mollie, on the story of love, tragedy and betrayal." Because it was Mollie, who suffered the murder of her mother and sisters one after another, who managed to get the FBI to Oklahoma.

Leonardo Dicaprio and Lily Gladstone, on Sunday before the press conference. PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA (AFP)

Before Grann's book, very few Americans knew about the tragedy of the Osage, just as few know about the murder of African Americans in Tulsa in 1921, a city in which they had formed an incipient bourgeoisie. Wasn't it a risk to Scorsese? Before he responded, DiCaprio had already thrown several flowers at him: "I've grown up seeing the artistic commitment between Marty and DeNiro, which have taken it to its highest level. Marty's perseverance and courage to bring truth to stories no matter what it is is unmatched." On that, Scorsese said, laughing: "At my age, what more can I do than take risks?"