The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
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The Wolf of Wall Street Movie Review
The Wolf of Wall Street is a 2013 biographical black comedy film directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio. It’s a hilarious movie and one of Scorsese’s best.
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“I am not gonna die sober!“
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Based on the true story of Jordan Belfort, the film follows his rise to a wealthy stock-broker living the high life to his fall involving crime, corruption and the federal government. There is only one issue that I have with this film and that is the one that plagues most of these crime films from Scorsese – it seems to be glorifying the lifestyle of criminals. Especially the third act suffered from that problem the most.
But ultimately that did not bother me as much this time around, certainly not as much as it did trouble me in ‘Goodfellas’. I may be hypocritical here, but in my book when a film makes me laugh as much as this one did, all of its supposedly maligned intentions are forgiven. And this is something that most critics did not pinpoint – the fact that the movie is not just incredibly funny, but downright hysterical in certain scenes. It’s easily one of the funniest comedies of its decade and a rare time when Hollywood actually produced a universally humorous product.
So yes, The Wolf of Wall Street is most definitely a black comedy first and foremost with its biographical trappings taking the backseat here. The narration of the main character is very familiar for the director, but it was funnier than usual, so it worked for me. And this brings me to Leonardo DiCaprio himself. He would go on to win an Oscar for ‘The Revenant’ two years later, which just goes to show how the Academy can screw things up with these awards. The fact that he won the award for just grunting in that movie when here he gave us a full package is ridiculous to me, so that later win can only be understood in the context of a make-up award.
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I am not the biggest fan of this actor. In fact, I find him to be rather unlikable. So imagine my surprise when I saw this movie and I just loved every second of him in it. He delivered the greatest actor performance of 2013 in a role that demanded so much from him. It’s an unhinged, maniacal and ridiculously over-the-top role, but DiCaprio actually managed to pull it off due to his sheer commitment. His line delivery and physical humor were both on-point.
This is Jordan Belfort’s show for the most part, but that doesn’t mean that we didn’t get to see some other performers shine, which is exactly what Jonah Hill did. I honestly don’t think that I’ve ever seen him be better than he was in the role of Jordan’s buffoonish friend. Hill was hilarious in both some funny facial expressions and silly lines of dialogue. The interactions between these two is the best part of this film. Their every scene was golden. Kyle Chandler is quite memorable in a very small role and Margot Robbie was excellent in a breakout role for her.
The Wolf of Wall Street is superbly directed and it’s one of the most polished Scorsese movies, not to mention one of the fastest-paced. The energy here is so manic and so extreme that it’s impossible not to be fully entertained throughout its three-hour runtime that is never felt at all. The soundtrack is fantastic and it made the movie even more fun how well it accompanied all scenes. There are so many sequences here that remain stuck in my head all the time – Jordan’s wife teasing him, him being high on ludes and trying to get into a car, him trying to bribe an investigator and all of those sex scenes that were so memorable. It’s a deranged, manic look into the depravity and debauchery of these lifestyles that is fueled by incredibly well written dialogue.
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The Wolf of Wall Street is another Scorsese movie that seems to be glorifying the lifestyles of criminals, but at the end of the day I could forgive this movie for that due to the sheer number of laughs that it has given me. This is a rare Hollywood movie from this decade that was a full-blown comedy and a hilarious one at that. Leonardo DiCaprio gave his career-best performance in the iconic role of Jordan Belfort and Jonah Hill was also incredible. The movie is three hours long, but you never feel it as it’s so insanely entertaining and featuring numerous unforgettable moments of deranged behavior. It’s one of the briskest, funniest and most quotable movies of its time.
My Rating – 4.5
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