SCORSESE INSISTED ON MAKING IT IN OKLAHOMA BECAUSE OF A COMMITMENT HE MADE TO THE OSAGE NATION

Scorsese made the film out of a desire to bring this story to an even wider audience — and out of respect for the Osage people. “Marty joined me in Oklahoma in October 2019 and we looked at a bunch of locations,” the film's location manager Mike Fantasia says. “He insisted on making it in Oklahoma because of a commitment he made to Geoffrey Standing Bear, the principal chief of the Osage Nation. You know, we could have saved millions of dollars by going to Georgia, because of the incentive, but he said, ‘Well, how can I make this in Georgia?’”

But the film was able to utilise the Oklahoma state film incentive programme administered by the Oklahoma Film

+ Music Office. “The Office began strategically working to recruit this project to Oklahoma immediately following the industry announcement of the acquisition of the novel’s film rights by Imperative Entertainment in 2017,” Oklahoma Film & Music Office director Jeanette Stanton says. “Scouting for the film began in 2019 with production representatives meeting with Osage Nation Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear as they sought to create an authentic portrayal of the Osage Nation and indigenous peoples. It was through the collaborative efforts of state, tribal, city and community leadership as well as the studio, that Killers of the Flower Moon was successfully produced in Oklahoma throughout 2021.”

The film stalled because of COVID and scouting re-started in September 2020. The bulk of the filming had finished by October 2021 and then the crew went back in May 2022 to shoot the opening of the movie: “It was a seasonal shot Marty wanted. He wanted it shot in the springtime with green grass,” Fantasia says.

Almost exactly one year on and Killers of the Flower Moon gets its world premiere in Cannes. “I did speak with one of the producers a couple months ago and he had seen the frst cut and he said it's amazing," Fantasia says. "He said: ‘This is a Martin Scorsese epic of the Old West and it’s going to blow people's socks of’.”

Scorsese’s insistence on flming in Oklahoma did bring some problems. “We were in a relatively remote location in Oklahoma, far from really any production support. Everything had come from LA or New York or Atlanta — some stuf came from Texas,” Fantasia says. “We shot in an area that really hadn't seen much flming. They’d had a couple of flm projects in the past but not much. And we went from prepping in a horrendous snowstorm and ice storm in March, to 113º and 100% humidity in August. Rain, thunder, tornadoes, lightning — terrifc challenges as far as the production was concerned but, you know, we never missed a day. We could always flm somewhere and working with the Osage Nation was fantastic. They were heavily invested in the flm and Marty did an incredible job of working with them and co-ordinating with them. I don't know how many meetings he had with the chief and elders before we ever launched into production. We had elders on set virtually every day.”

Discomfort and bad weather didn’t deter Scorsese from being at almost every shoot. “We had some very difcult locations. I mean, we were on ranches, we were out in the woods — we were in a lot of places that were difcult for a 78-yearold guy to get to and motivate around. I mean, he insisted. And, you know, we put it in some tough spots. He didn't take easy locations and he loved every day of it,” Fantasia says. “I mean, he had a smile on his face. Every day. You could see that he was having a lot of fun. If you could call it that — but you could also see that he felt the gravity in the places we were.”

He adds: “The whole crew, I think, respected it. I mean, a lot of people on a flm crew are big old lugs but the whole company felt the weight of what we were doing and where we were doing it. People were very, very respectful.”

And the old divisions and memories of the Reign of Terror are still very much alive. “One day I was walking down the street in Pawhuska — where we were flming — with a local woman and she grabbed my arm as she was about to go across the street,” Fantasia says. “She said: ‘See this guy coming? Well, his great, great, great, whatever killed my great, great, great grandfather — he was Henry Roanhorse in the book.’ I was with Addie Roanhorse, his great granddaughter. And she said, ‘You know, I've got nothing against this guy. But I just don't deal with it. There's still some bad blood and there's still discrimination.’”

"The production was in Oklahoma for nearly a year accounting for 304 days including pre-production, principal photography, and post-production,” Stanton says. "This number does not include a small segment of flming in 2022 which included additional photography and reshoots." She adds: “We applaud the production for how intentional they were in working with the Osage Nation throughout the entire process. We also value how much the visiting cast and crew took interest in exploring our state’s culture and attractions during their time here, including visits to the First Americans Museum, the Philbrook, Woolaroc and the Outsiders House Museum.”

Director, screenwriter, actor and producer, Martin Scorsese has dedicated his life to cinema and the Cannes Film Festival has forever been a supporter of the veteran flmmaker. He was awarded the Palme d'or in 1976 with Taxi Driver, which was presented In Competition. He has come back to the Ofcial Selection on a regular basis and won Best Director in Cannes for After Hours, 10 years after the success of Taxi Driver

In 1998, he was president of the Jury that presented the Palme d'or to Greek director Theo Angelopoulos for Eternity and a Day — and four years later he chaired the Jury for the Cinéfondation and Short Films alongside the Iranian director, Abbas Kiarostami.

Since 1990 Scorsese has been a director of The Film Foundation, an organisation dedicated to protecting and preserving the world's motion-picture history and through which he has presented numerous flms at Cannes Classics.