This is informative although it doesn't add much that is not in the audio commentary track. Next is a 12 minute interview with Mardik Martin with clips from the film. Rather than run it concurrent with the movie it is a seperate extra that features scenese from the movie that sometimes are pertinant to what Scorsese and Mardik are talking about. If anything we get treated to Scorsese's biography of his early years in New York and in film school straight from the horses' mouth. However Scorsese talks fast and always has something interesting to say. Instead it seems he and Mardik were interviewed and the commentary is merely a summation of their interview. The commentary is somewhat of a disappoiointment if you're expecting Scorsese to elaborate on the actual film as it plays. The soundtrack sounds pretty good although it is far from exceptional.įirst up is an audio commentary track with Martin Scorsese and Mardik Martin which is about 45 minutes long. Yet some scenes like when the Girl and JR meet for the first time sound good enough and at least don't have a dubbed look. Much of the dialogue sounds muffled and distant with an echo, which is part is due to this being a student film. Sometimes the image looks bad but considering that Scorsese shot the film over a couple years as a student project it looks good.Īudio is presented in Dolby Digital mono and sounds okay. The contrasts are often very good even though there is a certain soft look to the film. Much of the film was shot in 35mm and it has a very grainy dark look. The DVD is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and it looks good. is defined by his surroundings to the point that he probably won't ever leave. The difference is that in I Vitelloni the young man at the center of the film gets up and leaves his town and his buddies. Who's That Knocking at My Door has influences including Fellini's I Vitelloni, which too involves a group of young men hanging out together doing nothing particularly interesting with their lives. However it is what makes the film interesting. And maybe it is this provencialism that Scorsese feels uncomfortable about. And just as surely he is tied closely with his religion because it gives him meaning and existence. is in a love/hate relationship with his buddies but he understands them. It is also what makes the film a personal expression which Scorsese feels a bit embarrassed abou today. Scorsese knows his own personal limitations and contradictions and he wears them on his sleeve. Scorsese grew up with these guys and in some ways J.R. In this way he is mentally crippled by his own stupidity and will probably never be able to deal with women unless they hone close to his narrow version of their purpose in life. To him they fall into two categories a Madonna (virgins) or a whore (broads). Like too many guys in this scene he has trouble with women. Here the film explores J.R's inability to deal with a relationship out of the context of his Catholic upbringing. The exception is the relationship between J.R. These are mostly trivial things that go on in his life serving that fill in the gaps of loneliness, boredom and guilt. deals with on a daily, weekly, monthly basis. They instead serve an impressionistic tone showing us what J.R. Many of these scenes work as pure cinema even though they don't necessarily move the story forward. The film has a good many stylistic flourishes including the opening sequence, the title sequence, a dream / fantasy sequence with nudity, a long slow motion scene with the guys fooling around and a scene in a church at the end. is driven by his Catholic upbringing as well as his love of movies – particularly John Wayne movies. (Harvey Keitel) a young unemployed man living in New York's lower East side, hanging out with his friends and trying to deal with his new found relationship with a woman simple called 'The Girl' (Zina Bethune) in the film's credits. It also has - at times - the feel of a series of film exercises with a few tricks thrown in for good measure. Instead the film is a series of really well directed and conceived scenes many of which were shot over a couple years and conceived as separate films. Yet as a plot driven film it leaves much to be desired. But if you can watch the film without a biased feeling toward the filmmaker it is still easy to see that this independently made first feature has a lot of ambition and style from someone who knows what to do behind the camera and in the editing room. This is obvious now that we know that the filmmaker is Martin Scorsese. Who's That Knocking at My Door is a personal film by a filmmaker with enormous talent.
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