Martin Scorsese Would Prefer That You Don’t Watch ‘The Irishman’ On Your Phone

Thanksgiving was last Thursday, but you should be thankful for things all year, and this holiday season, I’m thankful for a new Martin Scorsese movie. The Irishman, the director’s first (non-Bob Dylan: master troll) film since 2016’s Silence, deserves to be seen in a theater, but because that’s not an option for everyone, watching on Netflix will do. As long as you’re not watching on your phone while taking the bus to work.

“I would suggest — if you ever want to see one of my pictures, or most films — please, please don’t look at it on a phone, please. An iPad, a big iPad, maybe,” Scorsese recently said on Popcorn With Peter Travers. “I’m not saying because, ‘Oh, I made it.’ It was an interesting narrative structure, and it got me involved each time… I think I made it to cover all the bases in terms of how you could watch this picture. Ideally, I’d like you to go to a theater, look at it on a big screen from beginning to end. And I know, it’s long — you gotta get up, you gotta go to the bathroom, that sort of thing, I get it — but also at home, I think if you can make a night of it, or an afternoon thereof, and know that you’re not gonna answer the phone or you’re not gonna get up too much, it might work.”

If you want to watch a movie on the toilet, make it something from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, then flush it. Right, Marty Anyway, because even Scorsese understands that you might need to stretch your legs during The Irishman, a three-and-a-half-hour film (it’s excellent, but 3.5 hours is still 3.5 hours), here’s the best time to take a break.