Netflix launches "The Irishman" Trailer -- Right After Tarantino's New Movie Opens

I don't think it is too coincidental that Netflix waited until just AFTER QT's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" opened and got its day in the sun to unleash the first trailer for Martin Scorsese's The Irishman. (Its on YouTube.)

In some ways, "OAITH" stole "The Irishman'" thunder. "The Irishman" went into production first and one of its claims to fame is that it is the first Scorsese movie with Al Pacino.

Ah, but then we suddenly got "the first Tarantino movie with Al Pacino."

So Big Al is back in action in movies for TWO major directors he never worked with. His "Hollywood" role proved to be a somewhat extended cameo; I think Pacino will be in The Irishman at more length. He plays Jimmy Hoffa -- hey, Jack Nicholson played Hoffa way back in 1992. Oh well, Al and Jack both played the Devil, too.

There are other "hooks" to The Irishman: Robert DeNiro returns to his mentor Scorsese after years away(years in which Leo DiCaprio took the slot over from DeNiro) .Joe Pesci rejoins Scorsese AND DeNiro and comes out of retirement to do so. And Harvey Keitel comes back to Scorsese decades after "Mean Streets" and "Taxi Driver."

Another hook: as visible in the new trailer for "The Irishman," a current rage (CGI "de-aging" of old actors) will be used to give us "young DeNiro, young Pacino, and young Pesci"(at least) in some scenes. You can see the effect in the trailer -- it looks a little "glazed" to me, but what the heck.

And of course there is the hook that this is a Scorsese mob movie. We've had a few: GoodFellas, Casino, Gangs of New York, The Departed -- but we can always use another. We're talking Irish mobsters(like The Departed) but also Mafia? And we're talking Jimmy Hoffa.

Anyway, I'm guessing that Netflix held off on promoting "The Irishman"(for fall release) until the QT cloud had settled. Not to mention, with Pacino in a hot new movie for ANOTHER auteur(QT) it helps sell "The Irishman."

Which brings me to an/the interesting aspect of "The Irishman."

Its for Netflix. And evidently Scorsese was balking for awhile -- backtracking on his agreement - that this movie NOT be shown in a lot of theaters. It will be shown for a short time in a FEW theaters, but "Netflix wants to be Netflix" THEIR selling point is: "Netflix has produced this great Scorsese movie, so you have to watch it on Netflix."

It looks like Scorsese is giving in. He gave an interview this week in which he said "no other studio wanted to make this movie at this expense..I'm grateful that Netflix gave me the chance."(paraphrased.) Translation: "The Irishman" won't be opening on 3,500 screens. Just a few. Mainly it will be on Netflix. (Scorsese had started balking, by the way, when his pal Spielberg came out in public to say that Netflix movies should not be nominated for Oscars.)

I've personally gotten used to "the Netflix movie" pretty quick-like. I've given my "best movie of 2018" slot to "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs," a Coen brothers movie that I was only able to see on Netflix. I couldn't see it in a theater locally. And I know that "Roma" is a big deal.

Indeed, I suppose this personal question looms before me: "Will The Irishman beat Once Upon a Time in Hollywood as my favorite movie of 2019...and will The Irishman being a Netflix movie affect that decision?"

Not to mention: my favorite movie of the 2010's so far is my favorite movie of 2013: Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street. Can/will Martin Scorsese's The Irishman beat THAT?

Thus, life stays interesting. Hah.

Anyway you cut it, I am excited to soon see a Martin Scorsese mob movie with DeNiro, Pesci, Keitel, and Pacino. And Ray Romano, too!

PS. Word is that Scorsese is finalizing talks for the stars for his next movie: Leo DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro -- Scorsese's two greatest proteges -- together for the first time in a movie about murders of Oklahoma Native Americans in the 1920s, as part of a scheme to take their oil. Bobby's the villainous oil baron; Leo's...FBI? Not sure. We'll see. (I think this story was one of the segments in the old 1959 James Stewart movie, "The FBI Story.")