14-05-2025
Robert De Niro Unveils First Footage From Doc About Fatherhood and Says: ‘I Always Want There to Be Movies in Cinemas'
Robert De Niro unveiled the first teaser for a new documentary he's making about his late father during a Cannes Film Festival conversation on Wednesday.
The discussion was moderated by the French visual artist JR, with whom De Niro is working on the film. 'We're kind of seeing where we're going,' the 81-year-old actor said about the project. 'I don't know where we'll go. There's no time limit, as far as I'm concerned. You just do it and wherever it arrives or winds up, that's OK.'
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The clip featured stunning blown-up photos of De Niro's father, a painter who died in 1993, placed around New York City — including on a boat in the harbor — as well as an appearance by Martin Scorsese. Though many of De Niro's answers to JR's questions about the film were painfully short — even hostile — the teaser saw him opening up more about his own journey with fatherhood as well as his mortality.
'Ultimately, it would be something that only time can make it more special,' De Niro said in the teaser. 'It's not essential that I see the final thing.' When asked if he was afraid of death, De Niro said: 'I don't have a choice, so you might as well not be afraid of it.'
Picking back up on the topic during the conversation, De Niro said he wished to 'adjust' his answer a little. 'I'm afraid, but I don't have a choice,' he said. 'So if you know you don't have a choice, you might as well not be afraid of it. You just have to learn to embrace life, move forward and take everything good and bad.'
De Niro said he isn't sure exactly when the film will come out and that production may continue even after his death. 'So once I'm not even around, he's just going to be shooting on and on forever, asking me questions when I'm in my coffin,' he said of JR.
Beyond Scorsese, JR said Leonardo DiCaprio, who presented De Niro with his Cannes honorary Palme d'Or on Tuesday night, is also featured in the project. During the opening ceremony, DiCaprio said of De Niro: 'That's the thing about Bob: he doesn't say much, but when he does, it matters. Whether it's for his friends, his family, fighting for democracy or supporting the art of filmmaking — he shows up.'
De Niro then delivered a fiery speech railing against U.S. President Donald Trump, calling him a 'philistine president' and declaring him an enemy of the arts. 'In my country, we're fighting like hell for the democracy we once took for granted. And that affects all of us here because the arts are democratic,' De Niro said. 'Art is inclusive. It brings people together, like tonight. Art looks for truth, art embraces diversity and that's why art is a threat — that's why we are a threat — to autocrats and fascists.'
At a certain point in the talk on Wednesday, the audience grew antsy with the dynamic between De Niro and JR, with one audience member even yelling: 'Talk about cinema!' It was certainly a different atmosphere than during the opening ceremony, when De Niro then delivered a fiery speech railing against U.S. President Donald Trump, calling him a 'philistine president' and declaring him an enemy of the arts.
But De Niro got back into his groove when the conversation pivoted to audience questions, beginning with one about the current political turmoil around the world and how we found ourselves in this situation.
'People have to stand up for what's right because inherently we know what is right, and certain people are doing what's wrong,' he said. 'People really know what you have to do to do the right thing, and people who are not doing the right thing know they're not. And it has to bother them in some way.'
De Niro continued, 'The point is that people have to have the right to make decisions collectively together, and there are many people who don't believe in that. They don't want to give it up or even do the right thing — but I don't understand that because it would give them even more power if they did the right thing.'
He was also asked about the current state of cinema today, to which he replied: 'I don't even know if I have a theory on it at this point,' adding that all he knows is 'telling stories visually in film or whatever it is.' However, De Niro said he always 'wants there to be movies in cinemas like this, because there's a difference in having an experience in a theater than having one alone … Something about the tradition of being in a movie theater, experiencing whatever's being shown together, is just special. And you can't take that away from what it is.'
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