'Goncharov' isn't a real Scorsese movie, but Tumblr convinced the internet it's a classic - NBC News

Martin Scorsese's 1973 mafia masterpiece "Goncharov" is re-emerging online arsenic movie buffs obsess implicit the communicative of corrupted powerfulness and loss. Its haunting taxable opus is yet connected Spotify. The poster — which features Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Gene Hackman and Cybill Shepherd against an Italian cityscape — has gone viral. The film's emotion triangle and homoerotic undertones person inspired hundreds of stories connected the fanfiction tract Archive of Our Own.

The catch: "Goncharov" isn't real. It's an elaborate, and convincing, Tumblr bit.

The fictional movie follows Goncharov, a erstwhile Russian mobster and discotheque manager who gives up a beingness of transgression to settee successful the “seemingly idyllic Naples” with his woman Katya aft the autumn of the Soviet Union. But successful Naples, helium meets Andrey “The Banker” Daddano, who becomes his rival and implied emotion interest. While she grieves her father's death, Katya meets Sofia, and they make a adjacent relationship brimming with implied intersexual tension.

There’s besides “Ice Pick Joe,” an oculus patch-wearing American transplant who was scheduled for a lobotomy earlier helium escaped a psychiatric installation and turned to organized crime.

The movie's rubric tin beryllium traced backmost to a years-old Tumblr post, erstwhile a idiosyncratic published a photograph of a brace of "knockoff boots." Instead of a marque name, the tag connected the boots read: "The top mafia movie ever made. Martin Scorsese presents GONCHAROV. Domenico Proccacci production. A movie by Matteo JWHJ0715. About the Naples mafia."

The idiosyncratic appears to person since deleted their blog. In 2020, different Tumblr idiosyncratic reblogged the post with a screenshot of a remark that read, "this idiot hasn't seen goncharov."

The fake movie "inexplicably started to prime up traction" during the play of Nov. 19, according to Polygon. The New York Times reports that "Goncharov" was the apical trending taxable connected Tumblr by Monday evening, followed by "Martin Scorsese." In the week since, it's made its mode to Twitter and TikTok, wherever the tag #goncharov has implicit 7 cardinal views.

Even Tumblr is successful connected the joke.

It's "hard to ideate that truthful fewer ppl person seen it," Tumblr posted connected its Twitter account.

The thoroughly elaborate lore surrounding "Goncharov" has been a collaborative effort by Tumblr users, galore of whom person been keeping way of developments successful an extensive Google doc. Users sermon imaginable crippled points and different details successful a Discord server that has tens of thousands of members. Tumblr users person already established that "Goncharov" complies with the Hays Code, the time-period due manufacture guidelines that prohibited nudity, profanity and realistic violence.

The Google doc besides includes a scene-by-scene breakdown of the fictional film, which culminates successful Goncharov's decease and a changeable of a breached timepiece — a recurring taxable passim the story.

Tumblr users person written elaborate analyses of the film’s usage of clocks. Tumblr idiosyncratic nautilusopus, for example, opined that connected the surface, “Goncharov” whitethorn look to beryllium a “cautionary communicative astir powerfulness corrupting,” but is “first and foremost astir loss, successful each its antithetic forms.”

“I’m some benignant of amazed and frustrated radical miss this, fixed however utterly pervasive the movie is with its timepiece symbolism — it’s the 1 happening everyone remembers astir it, it was successful each the tie-ins,” they wrote successful a Tumblr post.

Another Tumblr idiosyncratic composed an archetypal opus for “Goncharov,” and posted expanse music.

The film's "official" poster was designed by Alex, an creator known online arsenic Beelz, who said they were inspired by different posters from the 1970s.

"I tried to spell for the hand-painted look," they said. "Some radical accidental the poster looks excessively modern though."

Some Twitter users look to person fallen for the bit, tweeting that they thought that the movie was existent due to the fact that of its newfound virality.

"Tumblr has been talking astir a martin scorsese movie called goncharov and one was getting truly into it, truly looking guardant to watching it, and past it turned retired that they made it up completely," Twitter idiosyncratic @davemakes said.

Another expressed disbelief astatine however rapidly Tumblr users created the mythos of the film.

"The goncharov spot connected tumblr close present is 1 of the insane things I eve ever seen," Twitter idiosyncratic @gwenstacying said.

Martin Scorsese is successful connected the joke. In a TikTok posted Friday, his girl Francesca Scorsese shared a screenshot of a substance speech with the legendary director.

"Did u spot this?" she asked, on with a nexus to a New York Times nonfiction astir "Goncharov."

"Yes. I made that movie years ago," helium replied.