In this way, JR and his friends are totally detached from the mafioso stereotypes which often define Italian-Americans on-screen. In one charming scene, JR meets a girl on the Staten Island Ferry and proceeds to clumsily deliver a spiel on the brilliance of John Ford’s The Searchers. Keitel’s JR is a thinly veiled substitute for Scorsese himself. With this debut film, the director chose to cast a light upon the environment and culture in which he’d grown up, and in doing so gives a profoundly authentic impression of the Italian-American experience. His erratic editing style and monochrome photography echoes Jean-Luc Goddard, but Scorsese’s subjects are distinctly American. Like many of his contemporaries, Scorsese’s early films owes a great debt to the French New Wave. The new title was taken from the song by The Genies which plays over the end credits. Nevertheless, the film did not receive a wide distribution for over a year, when it was picked up by exploitation distributor Joseph Brenner and a graphic sex scene was hastily added in order to court the exploitation market. Roger Ebert instantly described the film as “a great moment in American movies”, and later reflected that it had announced “the arrival of an important new director”. It was this version of the film, now titled I Call First, which screened at Chicago in 1967.ĭespite the film’s stilted production, Scorsese’s talent was quickly recognised. These scenes were shot on lower-quality film stock and spliced with the existing footage, the only giveaway being the fluctuating length of Keitel’s hair. Keitel was reluctantly brought back for reshoots and Zina Bethune cast as his girlfriend. The following year, Scorsese procured the finance necessary to extend the scope of the film and introduced a romantic side-plot. In Scorsese’s own words, the initial screening was “a disaster” and his work was “universally hated”. The resulting first cut was a largely plotless, 65-minute effort which followed JR and his friends as they goofed, got drunk, and pursued women across Little Italy. Harvey Keitel, then working as a court stenographer, was enlisted for his acting debut in the lead role of “JR”. The film started life as a student project in 1965, curiously titled Bring on the Dancing Girls.

Drawing upon his own experiences, Scorsese’s first film is an uneven but complex meditation on Italian-American identity, faith, and masculinity – all themes which have continued to preoccupy his work for the last half century. Shot on a minuscule budget and cobbled together over several years, the film would provide a touchstone for the rest of the young director’s pioneering career. Originally screened under the title I Call First but now commonly known as Who’s That Knocking at My Door, Scorsese’s debut may not be as well regarded as his later work, but it’s influence is every bit as pervasive. Fifty years ago, at the Chicago International Film Festival, the world was introduced to Martin Scorsese. It was in November that year that a young graduate of the New York University premiered his directorial debut. Yet amid the sound and fury of these provocative films, the arrival of another pioneering film-maker is often overlooked.

The likes of Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night, and The Dirty Dozen ushered in a new era of mainstream film-making which unashamedly dealt in graphic themes of violence, sexuality, and race. The year 1967 is rightly lauded as a landmark in American cinema.

Whos that knocking at my door