Director Scorsese appeals for 'visual literacy'

To prove his point, Scorsese screened a clip from “Vertigo”—hailed today as a work of genius, but at the time of its release in 1958 regarded as just another in a string of crowd-pleasing Alfred Hitchcock psycho thrillers.

You're not going to get kids in school watching something like "Vertigo". The few that don't fall asleep will be kids who like film anyway.

But to fully comprehend the language of moving images, it is essential to “preserve everything” from blockbusters to home movies by way of films that may not look like works of art on first showing, he said.

This guy is talking out of his ***. Does he really mean we need to preserve the latest Adam Sandler or Ben Stiller movie, in case it's anything more than an unfunny travesty made for morons to watch?

He contradicts himself too by saying that we need to "preserve everything", when he had just said:

“Young people need to understand that not all images are out there to be consumed like, you know, fast food and then forgotten,” he said.

So, "not all images are out there to be consumed like, you know, fast food and then forgotten", meaning that, some of them are then? So, you don't mean "preserve everything" then, do you?

He makes more sense than you give him credit for. If the technology is there and preservation is commercially feasible, why not preserve everything? As horrible as Adam Sandler movies are, preserving them may be a necessary evil of an otherwise great policy to ensure that all films will be kept in great condition for years to come. if we start cherry-picking right now what is "good" and what is "bad," then inevitably a good film will be left behind because it wasn't appreciated. That is why he used Vertigo as an example...hence his other point is not contradictory at all. Preserving everything will ensure good, underrated films are preserved -- not treated like fast food and then forgotten.

Many American students are illiterate in English, yet we should expend more resources to make them "visually literate"? I think young people are too "visually literate" in a culture which inundates them with movies, music videos, video games, and endless advertisements. Visual entertainment is taking the place imagination and original thought.

Visual entertainment is taking the place imagination and original thought.<<

You seem to be implying that it's the visual element, and not the entertainment element, that is damaging to imagination and original thought?

Inundation by a lot of visual media is not the same thing as intelligent and discriminating understanding of visual media...which is what Scorsese is asking for.

Since it's how you watch more than how much you watch that is the issue, simply reducing exposure to visual media isn't going to produce a flowering of imagination and original thought. That would be too easy!

This guy is talking out of his ***. Does he really mean we need to preserve the latest Adam Sandler or Ben Stiller movie, in case it's anything more than an unfunny travesty made for morons to watch?

You surprise me. With the cracking sense of humour and sheer joie de vivre you exude, I would have assumed you were a fan.

No, but by the looks of it, you are.