Mr. SCORCESE: Well, I think primarily because so many of us have come from immigrant families.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

He describes them as a witty parody mix of Martin Scorcese's Taxi Driver and early Jean-Luc Godard gangster movies.

BBC: Festival celebrates mobile phone movies

Mr. SCORCESE: So yeah, it's a very interesting - and right outside - two blocks away - it was America.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: Yeah, and they just - I mean literally - extreme, extraordinarily, violent time - I mean in all of the major cities in the East Coast.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: Yeah, my grandparents didn't quite believe that.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: That was a big deal.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: It was worst than that.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: Actually, we toned it down.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. MARTIN SCORCESE (Movie Director): Thank you.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: You mean it's not.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Director Martin Scorcese knows movies.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Martin Scorcese joins us.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film

Mr. SCORCESE: One of the things we wanted to deal with the gangs was to depict head on the resistance, a blindness about what, you know, that the reality in this country is built by the ingenuity and the power and the extraordinary contributions of the immigrants.

NPR: Scorsese on the Immigrant Experience on Film