Larry Downing / Reuters file

Bill Clinton

Famed director Martin Scorsese has teamed up with HBO to produce a documentary on former president Bill Clinton, the premium cable network announced Monday.

"President Clinton is one of the most compelling figures of our time, whose world view and perspective, combined with his uncommon intelligence, make him a singular voice on the world stage," HBO executives said in a statement.

The film will have the former president's cooperation. "I am pleased that legendary director Martin Scorsese and HBO have agreed to do this film,” Clinton said. “I look forward to sharing my perspective on my years as President, and my work in the years since, with HBO's audience.”

Since leaving office, Clinton has worked with his own William J. Clinton Foundation, which promotes and addresses international causes.

Scorsese has received numerous awards for his filmmaking, including an AFI Life Achievement Award in 1997, and a 2006 best director Oscar for "The Departed."

His previous work for HBO includes "Boardwalk Empire," for which he directed the series pilot and serves as executive producer; a 2011 documentary on Beatle George Harrison; and a 2010 documentary on Fran Lebowitz.

No release date or title have yet been given for the Clinton documentary.

"You talkin' to me?" "I'm funny how? I mean funny like I'm a clown. I amuse you? I make you laugh?" "When I was growing up, they would say you could become cops or criminals. Today, what I'm saying is this: When you're facing a loaded gun, what's the difference?"

(Note: video clips may contain profanity or violent imagery.)

Millions know Martin Scorsese as one of America's premiere film directors, and for the past 40-odd years, he's been giving them exactly what they want: Cops, criminals and guns in the face. In both scenes and quotes from his dozens of films (above: "Taxi Driver," "Goodfellas" and the film that finally won him the director Oscar, "The Departed"), Scorsese has been both a crowd-pleaser and an auteur unlike almost anyone else in Hollywood. And on Saturday, he turns 70.

Scorsese has long incorporated elements of his own life and experiences -- Catholicism, New York, his Italian heritage -- into his films, all while exploring wide-ranging subjects including boxing ("Raging Bull"), media satire ("The King of Comedy"), madness ("Taxi Driver") and even period pieces ("The Age of Innocence").

He's made comedies ("After Hours"), controversial religious films ("The Last Temptation of Christ"), animated breakthroughs ("Hugo"), biopics ("The Aviator") and even a Michael Jackson video ("Bad"), but he'll always be best known for his unstinting, stylized looks into gangster life -- from "Mean Streets" to "Goodfellas" to "Casino," "Gangs of New York," and "The Departed." And while he didn't invent the idea of a long tracking shot all done in one take, he did make it part of his regular repertoire, along with perfectly on-point use of classic rock music as part of the soundtrack (it's hard for many "Goodfellas" fans to hear the coda from "Layla" any more without thinking of dead, frozen bodies). 

But don't think that Scorsese -- who loves watching and immersing himself in films almost as much as he does making them -- is slowing down any time soon: The director/producer/writer (who has even appeared in a few movies as an actor over the years, including "Quiz Show" and films of his own like "Raging Bull" and "The King of Comedy") is currently filming "The Wolf of Wall Street" for release next year, with more to come.

So here's to Martin Scorsese -- and yes, the answer is: We are talkin' to you.

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Martin Scorsese is not known for making comedic movies. But in person, he's a complete crack-up. Just ask TODAY's Al Roker, who sat down with the veteran director behind such iconic films as "Raging Bull" and "Goodfellas" -- and talked (and laughed) with him about something very different: His first for-children and first 3-D film, "Hugo" (which leads all Academy Award nominees with 11), and the joys of being an older dad.

"The material -- Brian Selznick's book 'The Invention of Hugo Cabret' -- had all the elements of a story that could be enhanced by 3-D," said the filmmaker, who Roker reminded had expressed doubts a few years ago about being able to do a 3-D film. "I'm not talking about a 3-D that jumps out at you and throws spears and arrows and ping-pong balls. ... But I thought a 3-D that would enhance the story and immerse the audience into a special world ... (and the book) has that world."

A world that was surprisingly (for Scorsese) blood-free. "They kept looking at me, the crew," said Scorsese, "'What's happening?'" He told them, "Keep going men, we'll have like a train crash ... we'll do something."

He also revealed his inspiration for the film: His wife, Helen Morris, telling him to "make a film the kid could see for once" -- a line he used while accepting a Golden Globe earlier this month.

"The kid" is his 12-year-old daughter Francesca. Scorsese is 69, which makes for a big gap in their generations, but he says being an older father is all right. "It's a totally different experience (than being a younger father; Scorsese has two other daughters from his 20s and 30s)," he said. "Maybe it's more grandfatherly in a way. I became very, very immersed in her world ... how (children) perceive things, their imagination, her and her friends, so it became very natural to make a transition to a picture like this."

So, has she seen it? Several times, he reported. "She likes it. ... She says, 'Do I have to see it again?'" said Scorsese. "I said, 'Yes!' ... She's only seen it four, five times? What is this? Go, come on, sell it, you have to be there!"

"Hugo" is currently in theaters.

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Paramount Pictures

In "Hugo," Asa Butterfield and Chloe Grace Moretz play Parisian orphans on the trail of a mystery.

Those who know a little about the history of early movies will appreciate Martin Scorsese's "Hugo" on deeper levels, but it's a dazzling story even without that background.

Young Hugo (ocean-eyed Asa Butterfield) is a post-World War I orphan who lives alone in a cavernous Paris train station that's a steampunk dream of gears and spiral staircases, swirls of fog and smoke, monstrous trains and enormous clocks. First his father and then his uncle die, but if he can steal enough food to survive and keep the station's clocks running on time, no one will notice and send him to an orphanage. His nemesis is the sour-faced station inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen, a long way from "Borat"), but his real future lies with a mysterious man (Ben Kingsley) who runs a toy shop.

Hugo's been stealing parts from the toy shop to finish an automaton, an eerie silver automated man his father found in a museum attic. If he can finish it, he believes, he not only won't be so lonely, but he may receive a final message from his lost father. But when the toy-shop owner's goddaughter (Chloe Grace Moretz) befriends him, the two kids discover a mystery involving her godfather and his place in the history of early movies.

And from here on, the film unravels an enthralling class in early cinematic history. Those first filmmakers were just steps away from sideshows and magic acts, hand-cutting film so that skeletons appear to disappear, and terrifying audiences into believing that a filmed train is going to run them over. Scorsese deftly brings history books to life, so that his modern viewers, sitting in a 2011 venue with stadium seating, cupholders and 3-D glasses, can imagine a bit of the spell that movies must have cast over those earliest fans.

Is "Hugo" for children? Older ones may not appreciate all the Movie History 101 lessons, but they'll appreciate the story, and might learn a little as well. And even adults who think they don't care about the early days of film may find themselves spellbound by this love letter to celluloid.

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