Celebrating Tony Scott, The ‘More Talented’ Scott Brother
Between the brothers-Scott, Ridley has more name power with sci-fi cult hits Blade Runner and Alien under his belt, but Alex Pareene of Salon says that the Prometheus director didn’t get all of the talent – rather, the late Tony Scott, who jumped to his death yesterday according to Newser, deserves that honor for his lesser-known contributions to film.
Seems “ridiculous,” says Pareene, but think about Ridley Scott’s filmography. Though classics like Thelma and Louise and Gladiator immediately jump to mind, people forget about the rest of his films which Pareene calls “missteps, half-baked ideas, endless pompous historical epics, and OK genre exercises with heavy dollops of artistic pretension.”
He has a point. Though Ridley boasts numerous awards and critical acclaim for some of his best-known films, people forget about critical bombs and box-office flops like Legend, 1492: Conquest of Paradise, Hannibal, and Kingdom of Heaven. You might like some of these films, but they barely made a dent at the box office, divided or bored critics, and can only claim cult-status today… at best.
By contrast, though Tony never won any awards or earned great critical acclaim, Pareene maintains that even his worst movies are “hugely entertaining,” and none of them are “unwatchable,” asking readers to “stop and think” about films by each brother that they “actually loved.”
Among his accomplishments, Tony made a star of Tom Cruise with Top Gun, and Pareene offers that Tony’s collaborations with Denzel Washington (Man on Fire, Unstoppable) were better executed and more entertaining than those of Ridley and man-crush Russell Crowe. In the end, “Tony Scott was the better craftsman,” of the two, and if you hate some of the more stock elements of Tony’s films, then Pareene says that “you hate American pop cinema, and fun.”
Who do you think is the better filmmaker? Tony or Ridley Scott?