American filmmakerMartin Scorseseis known for his collaborations with many famous actors like Harvey Keitel, John C. Reilly, and Joe Pesci. His two most renowned leading men, however, are undoubtedlyLeonardo DiCaprioandRobert De Niro. WithKillers of the Flower Moon,the two award-winning thespians make their first on-screen appearance alongside one another in a project directed by Scorsese.
They’re his two most frequent acting collaborators and undoubtedly his two most important. Bar none. In fact, both collaborations are amongthe most iconic partnershipsthe film industry has ever seen — massive props to Scorsese for building such a rapport with not just one era-defining actor but two.
But the question is: of the two, which one is truly his greatest collaborator? The answer may seem obvious out of the gate, but there’s more to analyze with this line of inquiry than perhaps meets the eye. On the surface, there are three criteria that could be used for establishing an end to this argument: accolades garnered from major award organizations, average reception from critics, and numbers accrued at the box office. In the end, though, it might all just boil down to one simple line of inquiry: whose films were better?
Update June 18, 2025:Killers of the Flower Moonmarked the first time that Scorsese got to work with both Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio on the same film, so this article has been updated following its release and shows how well the new films putting all of them together worked within their larger body of work.
Accolades From Major Award Associations
In their firstcollaboration,Mean Streets,neither Robert De Niro nor Martin Scorsese garnered any attention from award ceremonies. However, as one of the most famous movies put to screen,Taxi Driverwas obviously acknowledged by several associations, with Best Director and Best Actor nominations across the board.
Their next project fell somewhere in the middle, asNew York, New Yorkpicked up four nominations from the Golden Globes, including one for Best Actor. Then, cameRaging Bull. It received eight Oscar nods (including Best Director, and a win for Best Actor), two at the Golden Globes (another win for De Niro), and four at the BAFTAs.
That rendered the boxing drama their most lauded film to date, but alas,The King of Comedyfailed to make any waves when awards season rolled around. However, they rallied in monumental fashion withGoodfellas. It had six nominations at the Oscars — another nomination for Best Director without a statue to show for it. Sensing a trend here? Their next three films —Cape Fear,Casino, andThe Irishman— had respectable runs at award ceremonies, but none solidified a victory.
At the turn of the 21st century, though, Scorsese began his partnership with Leonardo DiCaprio, and his Best Director hopes began anew. WithGangs of New York, he picked up multiple Best Director nominations, among which included a win from the Golden Globes. Nothing for DiCaprio, though. But withThe Aviator, they were both recognized by nearly every major ceremony, including Leo’s first Golden Globe win for Best Actor.
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In the end, Scorsese picked up four nominations from each major association throughout his five collaborations with DiCaprio — at the Oscars, he won once forThe Departed, while the Golden Globes gave him awards for bothGangs of New Yorkand, yes,The Departed.
De Niro picked up three nominations from the BAFTAs with a win forRaging Bull, four nods from the Globes with a win forRaging Bull, and three more from the Oscars with a win for, yes,Raging Bull. Then,The Aviatorbrought nominations to DiCaprio from all three associations, where the Globes actually granted him the honor.The Departedgarnered him a couple nominations, and then he received several nominations forThe Wolf of Wall Street. For that, he received another Golden Globe for Best Actor.
Box-Office Success
As one might have guessed, two of the biggest actors Hollywood has to offer working with a juggernaut director like Martin Scorsese resulted in constant money coming in from moviegoers worldwide. This is easily the least substantial category as far as criteria goes for establishing the “greatest” of the two partnerships, but box office success is undoubtedly noteworthy within the conversation.
Robert De Niro’s films with longtime collaborator Martin Scorsese garnered a total of $427.4 million on a $413.4 million budget. But withoutThe Irishman, which was released exclusively on Netflix with undisclosed numbers accrued, those totals would change to $419.4 million with a $200 million budget. Results of which would obviously change when adjusted for inflation, too, but that’s where this category gets a trifle precarious.
However, it is true that Leonardo DiCaprio’s collaborations with Martin Scorsese — which garnered $1.405 billion on a budget of $480 million — appear in the director’s six highest-grossing movies ever. The only film stopping DiCaprio from controlling the top five isCape Fear, which of course starred Robert De Niro. In the end, it’s rare for a Scorsese film not to succeed at the box office, but there’s no doubt that the films starring Leonardo DiCaprio raked in more viewership upon release.
Now, a large part of that can be attributed to Martin Scorsese’s established name value that materialized through his many collaborations without De Niro. In other words, without De Niro, there’s likely no collaborations at all between Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio. Both beloved partnerships have been firmly set in stone in large part due to their films’ positive reactions from critics.
Critical Reception
There could be a lot to uncover here, analyzing the individual assessments of each respective film in both collaborations according to the major film critics such as Roger Ebert, Leonard Maltin, Gene Siskel, Janet Maslin, and Richard Roeper. Maltin, for example, famously gave middling scores to films likeTaxi Driver,Casino, andShutter Island. However, the lowest score Roger Ebert gave to any of those three films wasShutter Island,with three-and-a-half stars out of four. The other two received all four stars.
So, with those disparities in mind, it should hardly be worth the time to go over the individual review scores from each critic for all fourteen films — nine for De Niro, five for DiCaprio — featured in this comparison. What seems far more worthwhile is taking the respective scores from consensus websites like Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, and IMDB, then averaging the nine numbers for De Niro in tandem with the five for DiCaprio.
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With regard to Rotten Tomatoes, perhaps the most reliable of the consensus websites: Robert De Niro’s collaborations with Scorsese hold an average approval rating of 86.3%, while Leo’s only reached 79.4%. And on the same website, the average scores of the audience’s ratings total 85.7% for De Niro and 82.8% for Leo. Fairly consistent numbers. This also does not count their recent film, Killers of the Flower Moon, but the number would still raise in De Niro’s favor.
Metacritic seemed to favor the De Niro partnership to a much more significant degree, as well. Their films together have an average rating of 83 on Metacritic, while DiCaprio’s films with Scorsese only reached 79.4%. Then, on IMDB, DiCaprio finally came out on top with an 8.0 average rating compared to Robert’s 7.7. Those results may shock fans who felt the DiCaprio side of the argument got shorted by critics, but in the end, there’s a reason several of De Niro’s collaborations with Scorsese are considered among the highest-rated films ever made.
The Films and Performances in Retrospect
It’s been two decades since Scorsese worked with DiCaprio for the first time — enough time has passed to fully analyze their filmography in a fresh, unbiased manner. De Niro just worked with Scorsese onThe Irishmanat the turn of the decade. Before that, though, they hadn’t worked together in twenty-four years. That allows for plenty of room to view those older projects from an objective, contemporary perspective.
So,The Irishmanaside, how did De Niro perform with Scorsese, in retrospect?Taxi Driver,Raging Bull, andGoodfellasare three of the most essential films of both men’s careers — analyzing them even after so much time feels redundant in today’s landscape. Those are three of the most well-known American-made films of New Hollywood, and Scorsese’s direction was consistently matched in quality by the acting of Robert De Niro.
They also put out some of the more underrated projects of their respective decades,likeThe King of ComedyandCasino. And whileNew York, New Yorkseems to get forgotten by more modern audiences, as well, there’s no denying that even their first collaboration together,Mean Streets, still holds up to this day.
And all of Leonardo DiCaprio’s collaborations with Scorsese have stood the test of time, most notablyGangs of New York,The Departed, andThe Wolf of Wall Street. But make no mistake about it:The AviatorandShutter Islandare popular in their own rights, still worth a watch more than a decade down the line. And whileThe Departedmay be their best overall project alongside one another, this duo brought out the best of their respective trades, particularly withThe Wolf of Wall Street.
No matter how you swing it, very few Scorsese films are not going to be worth a watch even after they’ve had time to age with any sort of significance. In a hundred years, film fans will still be talking about the many projects that these three produced. But ultimately, only one actor can come out on top as the greatest collaborator of Martin Scorsese.
So, Who Wins?
In the early 1980s, Scorsese was among a few directors who advocated for Congress to, ultimately, preserve certain films based on their historical, cultural, and aesthetic contributions to cinema. And that’s what has happened with the National Film Registry — since 1988, the board has selected almost 1000 films to be preserved in the Registry, and Scorsese is included among less than thirty directors with five or more films inducted.
And of those five preserved films, four starred Robert De Niro:Mean Streets,Taxi Driver,Raging Bull, andGoodfellas.Those are some the most seminal films throughout Martin Scorsese’s career. Sure, he won Best Director at the Academy Awards for his work onThe Departed,but still — many viewed the honor as one of recognition, more than anything. He had long been viewed as one of the most snubbed filmmakers in Oscars history, and that was due entirely to the string of films he worked on with Robert De Niro.
Just based on the numbers, average critical reception in tandem with money accrued at the worldwide box office and accolades won at major award ceremonies, Leonardo DiCaprio would undoubtedly be the answer to the question at hand. The numbers are fairly undeniable — based on those three qualifications, DiCaprio’s work with Scorsese reigned triumphant in every category save for critical reception. The numbers weren’t too close in that regard, but they didn’t need to be. DiCaprio’s films stomped De Niro’s at the box office and resulted in far too many accolades to ignore.
Scorsese hasn’t retired yet. It’s hard to answer who wins in this discussion. Many think Robert De Niro will forever be the greatest collaborator of Martin Scorsese, but the director’s run isn’t over yet. DiCaprio technically beat him in two out of three on-paper categories, but numbers don’t always tell the entire tale. Travis Bickle fromTaxi Driverand Jake LaMotta fromRaging Bullare among the two most iconic characters to ever surface from cinema, and that’s hardly scratching the surface of their world-famous collaborations. However,The Wolf of Wall Street’s Jordan Belfort is an unforgettable entry in the catalog of Scorsese’s characters. WithKillers of the Flower Moon, it gets trickier.
Clash of the Titans
Scorsese’s latest film to be released in theaters isKillers of the Flower Moon. It is also the first time that Scorsese has been able to work with both DiCaprio and De Niro in the same movie, making this a film decades in the making.
Both DiCaprio and De Niro are spectacular in the film. Scorsese knows how to get the best out of these actors, and these two are always stronger when working with Scorsese. All three of them together is a special kind of alchemy that is a big deal and a cinematic event in itself.Killers of the Flower Moonshows the question should not be who is Scorsese better with, DiCaprio or De Niro, but what is it about these two he has been drawn to and alsowhy the three of them do not work together more oftenwhen the results are as great asKillers of the Flower Moon.
