The Big Shave

When watching Martin Scorsese's first footsteps into film-making it occurs that only a very fortunate few might have experienced these cinematic nuggets before encountering the behemoth output he has since delivered. Made during his time at New York University, the three films serve as an indicator of what would follow with Scorsese at the helm of feature films such as Mean Streets and Taxi Driver in the coming ten years. Mutilation, straight- talking male buddies and ennui are themes honed in the Italian American's earliest works, Scorsese hallmarks easily identifiable for any self-respecting fan of American cinema viewing the films today.

Influences we are readily familiar with thanks to documentaries such as My Voyage to Italy and his Personal Journey Through American Movies are boldly recognisable; from the incendiary Colonel Blimp hunting sequence aped with the use of home furnishings in What's a Nice Girl..., to the swift use of editing throughout that reminds us of Messieurs Godard and Truffaut (or should that be Monsieur Coutard?). Scorsese is known as a director who wears his influences on his sleeve and the beginnings of that trait are present even here. The Big Shave's less than subtle metaphor for America's self-destructiveness at war with Vietnam is indicative of the vitality of the New American Cinema's outlook, whilst exhibiting a flair for dark humour and a confident use of music that points to the revolutionary works that were to come.

With these three short films Scorsese leaves an early legacy neither tentative or deliberately artsy, but confident and forthright, establishing an air of cool that has never left the director.

This film is closely related to my adolescence ... rather iconic. I've seen it only once a few months after completing fourteen years of age (1970). Back then, the UCSD had a very active cine-club ... and thanks to it I had access to films like La Jetée, Young Aphrodite, Midnight Cowboy, Catch-22, Deep Throat (in which I fell asleep after its first five minutes) and many others.

At first I found it rather boring and unappealing. A man shaving ... definitely isn't something a pubescent male teenager would care for, but since it's only six minutes long ... soon, the whole intended idea started to fall in place. The flowing and perfectly edited strong images left me totally assured that I was watching a powerful work of art and criticism. As the years passed by, the film's images were surely imprinted in my memory ... but the title simply vanished from all recall efforts. Once I got acquainted with IMDb's message boards, I posted a message asking about which could its title be ... promptly and correctly answered by an user signing as Weeping Prophet.

Usually The Big Shave is understood as a hyperbolic criticism towards America's engagement in the Vietnam war. While at a very shallow level it can be understood as so, the deeper message is very prophetic encompassing the whole future of America's mainstream film productions concerning the glorification of violence in itself. Well, in those happy days of open confrontation and anti-war rallies I understood it as a film about our everyday acts of self-destruction undertook as a matter of fact events ... including America's vaguely justified involvement in the civil war going on in Vietnam.

It's a film everyone should watch and one of Scorsese's most powerful films.

So I'm not the only person who's had this particular spooky dream! Plainly influenced by Kenneth Anger, this eye-watering short looks more like an early work by David Lynch than Martin Scorsese.

Saturday, the 8th of April was one of those days when I didn't have a lot of free time to watch a movie. On days like that, sometimes it's nice to watch a short film because at least it's something, and part of me feels compelled to at least log something every day.

So I picked the first short film that came to mind, which is one of the earliest things Martin Scorsese ever made: a dialogue-free horror film about a guy shaving. He keeps shaving more than he needs to, and things get bloody. That's about it.

It's kind of effective for something so simple? But I wish it had gone a little more extreme than it did (even though it gets pretty gross, I feel like even a young, possibly film student Scorsese could've done a bit more). Some of the editing has the feel of his later films, which was cool. And it gets a bit of an emotional reaction out of me as a viewer, as many of his longer and better films also do.

Martin Scorsese's third short film before he graduated into feature film making is,despite being only six minutes long,a considerable cinematic achievement.Even at this early stage in his career,Scorsese shows considerable technical excellence,distinctive style and panache,showing that in just the simplest,most banal of settings(a bathroom)on a zero budget,he can produce memorable images and moments that most other film directors can't manage in films three hours long. Apparently intended as a black joke against the then on-going conflict in Vietnam,the contrast between the clean,white bathroom and the young man's visceral,gory,but seemingly unconscious gradual self-harm while taking a shave brings sheer gasps and giggles of astonishment at it's sheer audacity.A taster of the brilliance to come in the next four decades.