3 great Martin Scorsese movies to watch on the auteurs birthday

At 83, Martin Scorsese remains one of the most iconic, celebrated and greatest filmmakers Hollywood has had the privileges to host. From his raw, intimate and electric portrayals of characters you spend a lot of time figuring out, to his love for ambiguity and mystery: his filmography is a roller coaster of emotions and they continue to shape character driven filmmaking.

As Martin Scorsese celebrates his 83rd year, here are three films with major Scorsese energy that keep pulling new generations into his world, and prove that every touch of his in films is "absolute cinema."

Shutter Island

We are starting off with one of DiCaprio's best performances to date, Shutter Island, which has made it's way to most "psychological thrillers you should watch" lists, and rightly so. Martin Scorsese builds the entire film like a maze as you grapple with the confusion of what's real and what's not. The storm, the score, the constant unease, everything pushes you deeper into Teddy Daniels’ unraveling mind. It is the kind of psychological thriller that does not rely on jump scares. It relies on atmosphere, dread, and the feeling that something is always slightly off.

In an interview with Indie London, Martin Scorsese opened up about what made him choose the film as he told the outlet,

"The first element that I connected with was the emotion. Sorry, that’s how it goes. I felt very empathetic for the character, sympathetic for the character, overwhelmed by the nature of the story of his character. It’s a hard film to talk about because I don’t want to give anything away but that, along with the vocabulary of cinema’s past and gothic literature… that, to me, opened the door and was really enticing. I don’t know how else to tell the story except to utilise that vocabulary: the rain, the darkness, the mansions, the framing, etc, the lighting and that sort of thing."

The setting also gives the film its power. Shutter Island is not just a location. It feels like a character with its own mood and secrets. The claustrophobic corridors, the cliffs, the crashing waves, the isolated asylum, everything amplifies the tension. You are trapped there with Teddy, and Scorsese makes sure you feel that isolation.

Available to watch on: Prime Video

Killers of the Flower Moon

Although Martin Scorsese's golden age lasted throughout the early 2000s and 90s, Killers of the Flower Moon released in 2023 is another classic film that has managed to capture the director's signature style with a historical twist. The film hits you with the kind of devastation that lasts long after the credits role as Scorsese takes one of the darkest chapters of American history and tells it with such clarity, restraint and emotional honesty. Instead of treating the Osage murders like a distant event, he brings you directly into the lives of the people who were forced to survive them. You feel the weight of every betrayal, every loss, and every moment of manipulation that shaped this tragedy.

Speaking about his experience in making the film, Martin Scorsese told The New Yorker,

"I think it goes back to a time in ’74, when I had this opportunity to spend some time, only a day or two, maybe two days, with the Oglala Lakota (Sioux) tribe, in South Dakota, and I was involved with a project that didn’t work out. It was a traumatic experience, and I was so young I didn’t understand. I met some Native Americans again in L.A. at the time, and we talked about another project, and I saw, too, that this incredible fantasy that we had growing up as children was something that—even despite the wonderful attempts at righting the wrongs of the Hollywood films with “Broken Arrow,” “Drum Beat,” “Apache,” “Devil’s Doorway”—all the films that were pro-Native American, there were still American white actors playing the Native Americans.

The film also stands out because Martin Scorsese refuses to glamorize violence. There is no stylized action or romanticized crime. Every death feels senseless and cold, and the film gives that violence the seriousness it deserves. You see how greed, entitlement, and systemic cruelty shaped the entire era. It is a story about exploitation that still feels relevant today, and it's largely because of how Martin Scorsese decides to tell it.

Available to watch on: Prime Video

Taxi Driver

Of course we had to include Taxi Driver, as it continues to remain one of the best films Martin Scorsese has made to date. The film stands out because it feels like a slow descent into a mind that never finds a way out. He builds the film with a raw and uncomfortable honesty that places you directly inside Travis Bickle’s loneliness until it starts to feel like a pressure cooker. The city feels alive in the worst way. It is grimy, restless, uncaring, and Scorsese shoots it as a reflection of Travis’ head. Every street, neon light, and late night taxi ride adds to the growing sense of isolation he cannot escape.

In an interview with Roger Ebert, Martin Scorsese called Taxi Driver a "feminist" film. Speaking to the critic, he said,

"This is my feminist film. Who says a feminist movie has to be about women? Feminist. Because it takes macho to its logical conclusion. The better man is the man who can kill you. This one shows that kind of thinking, shows the kinds of problems some men have, bouncing back and forth between the goddesses and whores. The whole movie is based, visually, on one shot where the guy is being turned down on the telephone by the girl, and the camera actually pans away from him. It’s too painful to see that rejection.

Robert De Niro delivers one of the sharpest performances of his career. He does not play Travis as a villain or a hero. He plays him as a man who is drowning and reaching for anything that feels like a purpose. Watching him latch onto ideas, people, and fantasies is unsettling because you can see how fragile his sense of reality becomes. It's truly one of the first films that established Martin Scorsese as a genius and readied us up for the decades of cinema he would dominate in his later years.

Available to watch on: Prime Video