Review of The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) by Joel F — 01 Dec 2014
Not quite what I was expecting when I first heard Scorsese was teaming up with DiCaprio again. Wolf is a comedy. A very raunchy comedy at that. I felt pretty gross watching it to be honest. Drugs, Sex, Drugs, Sex. Women for the most part were treated/portrayed very poorly throughout which made me feel pretty uneasy. I would have never thought I would have seen Leonardo DiCaprio, one of the best actors...ever, doing half of the things he did in this movie. Throw in Scorsese, one of the best directors...ever, and I left Wolf of Wall Street very confused. The movie just feels beneath them. I understand the necessity to push the envelope in today's world to get reactions out of people who have seen and heard it all already. But, I'm not really a fan.
That being said, it's very difficult to say that DiCaprio isn't on his A-game. The man is insanely talented and magnetic. Having him at the helm is the only reason I found it bearable. Throw in any other actor, and I would have turned it off 30min in.
Jonah Hill steals most scenes he is in and the brief appearances by McConaughey and Reiner are great.
The movie is extremely long at 3hrs. Extremely long. I found myself looking at the running time just an hour in. The plot is pretty simple: Man is a crooked broker who makes it rich and has tons of fun. That's it...for 3 hours. It's quite numbing seeing the same thing over and over. All you see is naked girls, people having sex, and people doing doing drugs (There was so, so much time devoted to just watching characters get high). There is nothing past that. I cant say there is character development or plot twists, or layers. Very flat. I absolutely hated pacing of the movie: short exposition, then the transition from normal guy to asshole is missed almost entirely.
The last chapter is one of the worst ones I've ever seen. How can you take the best part of the movie: likable DiCaprio as a villain we're silently rooting for to get away with it all...to 100% heel. And that "try-to-be-ironic" ending with the seminar...miss.
I will restate how much I hated how they portrayed women. None of them had strong roles until the very end (which came out of nowhere) and it resulted in her getting slapped and punched in the gut.
...I find myself resenting the movie the more I write.
I did like the fast-talking dialogue and found myself chuckling a few times, but overall, was quite, quite disappointed.
This review of The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) was written by Joel F on 01 Dec 2014.
The Wolf of Wall Street has generally received very positive reviews.
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