Martin Scorsese’s latest motion
picture comes hurling towards its audience as though thrown from an amusement
park ride. Loud, vulgar and covered in vomit, it’s the director’s most
controversial movie in years, not to mention his longest and perhaps his most
unabashed. The auteur is proving that even into his seventies he still has the
power to enthral, entertain and repulse with a wild film about greed and intemperance.
The Wolf of Wall Street is based on
the memoir of the same name written by Jordan Belfort, a former New York stockbroker who
lived a life filled with excess thanks to his shady stock market dealings in
the 1980s and 90s.
Joining Scorsese for a fifth time
as lead actor is Leonardo DiCaprio who plays Belfort with all the grace, charm and
sophistication you expect from a Wall Street swindler. DiCaprio is nasty, vile,
cruel and disgusting and yet you can’t help love both him and the character as
you watch him snort cocaine from a hooker’s anus or throw hundred dollar bills
in the trash. He’s made it, he’s living the American dream and he’s loving
every minute of it. Criticism has come from the fact that the central character
suffers no real comeuppance, no fall from grace. I disagree slightly with this
but would also argue that Scorsese and screenwriter Terrance Winter are showing
you how it is. The bad guy doesn’t always lose and in this case, he might not
win all the time but it makes no difference. You know he’s a dick and you know
he’s in the wrong but you also know that you want what he’s got.
