Anytime a high-profile filmmaker name-drops the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the chances are high that they’ll be disparaging the all-conquering comic book conglomerate for ruining the sacred artform of cinema, and they’re completely entitled to that opinion.
Quentin Tarantino has become the latest to jump on the bandwagon after making his feelings on the MCU perfectly clear during several recent media appearances, while Martin Scorsese’s thoughts on the matter have been so heavily-publicized and recanted that we don’t even need to explain the bushy-browed legends opinion.
In a turn-up for the books, though, a big-name director has voiced support for the Marvel machine, and it’s coming from a most unexpected perspective. Luca Guadagnino, the brains behind Best Picture nominee Call Me by Your Name, the Suspiria remake, and cannibal romance Bones and All, voiced his opinions to Total Film that he’d much rather head into the Spider-Verse than see the innumerable independent dramas rehash the same plot points.
“You have two different energies happening at the same time. One is the prototype machine, the labs where people make prototypes, that become beautiful, beautiful mementos that pave the way. And then there is the repetition. And you can see repetition and mechanism also in what they call art cinema. It’s become a genre in itself.
Is it better to see, again and again and again, the same queer comedy about hipsters in this bromance? Or is it better to see a big unapologetic fantasy movie from Hollywood, that, in a way, is enlightening you? Is it better that, or is it better Spider-Verse? I think it’s better to have Spider-Verse than the queer indie movie.”
Just like that, we have undeniable proof that not every eclectic creative responsible for acclaimed features that tug at the heartstrings and require constant emotional investment are opposed to the idea of several Spider-Men, multiverses, and spandex-clad crimefighters dispensing justice. Your move, Tarantino and Scorsese.