There may very well be a 110-minute gem within the trio of hours which is The Wolf of Wall Street, an often hilarious and pulse-pounding film with a predictable overall point to convey and curious ideas regarding content and length. Based on a true story, the film stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jordan Belfort, an up-and-coming Wall Street player who runs headfirst into the late-'80s crash and then, through desperation and inspiration, forges a new and not-so-legal path, generating enormous wealth by committing investment fraud with potent showmanship.
Directed with another form of potent showmanship by the legendary Martin Scorsese (see how the camera glides above, below, and through the chaos of the trading floors! see sex, drugs, more sex, and another round of drugs lit to perfection and perhaps even in glorious slow motion!), the film tries to condemn the modern capitalist urge while also recognizing the excitement and glamor of it when indulged to an extreme degree. And this is an interesting gambit, one perhaps more intriguing than a grim, straightforward repudiation in the vein of, say, Margin Call or the television film Too Big to Fail, although I guarantee a significant portion of the movie-going population will leave Scorsese's new film overcharged and enamored of the glitz-and-blitzed excess on display rather than frustrated and scared by it, which I presume is the director's imagined intent, one complicated, or even undermined, by his aesthetic and editorial choices.
DiCaprio commits himself 100 percent to a despicable character and delivers his most volatile and most amusing performance ever. I would not say it is his best, but there is pleasure in observing the actor, so careful and serious and thoughtful in general, play a hypnotic scene straight out of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in which his character tries (and fails) to move and communicate while out-of-his-mind high. He delivers his speeches to the traders in his employ with a level of ferocious energy which could leave fire-and-brimstone Southern preachers blushing.
The problem with The Wolf of Wall Street, one to which its hero can no doubt relate, is it goes and goes and goes, and it does not know when and where to stop. It is not hard to endure the largely fast-paced, if fairly story free three hours, yet there is a growing sense the film is repeating itself far more than it should, and it becomes tempting to pose the question, "Is this scene here because it is absolutely required, or because the director and his star are themselves under the spell of their subject and just need to go one set piece further, one sexual or narcotized spectacle further, because they can and because it is naughty and fun?" Direct fascination gives way to slightly numbed amusement as the film becomes a lumbering monster, and the first-person presentation sadly denies the audience the chance to spend more time with other individuals in the sphere of the DiCaprio character. The most notable example is an earnest, noble FBI agent played well by Kyle Chandler. His scenes are too few, our perspective on his drive and the pace of his investigation too limited. It is a shame the film does not step away from the decadence and the erotic absurdity, areas all too well explored after 180 minutes, to show the other side of the coin and become a more full-bodied portrait of the greed driven American masters of the universe and the wage earning people who try, with limited success, to regulate and punish them.
*** and a 1/2 out of ***** or B
Last edited by Holmes; 12-26-2013 at 12:18 PM.
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Good for Phoenix I guess but different actors put their own spin on things. Phoenix was so good he got outshined by his costar. Foxx put his on Charles and he did it very well.
Leo knocked this one out of the park. Easily better than Ejiofor in 12YAS who seems to be the favorite for Best Actor right now.
this film was incredible. If workflow is laid back tomorrow, I'll write a full review. 
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