![]() ![]() There are also extended set pieces, the most famous being Belfort's elongated Quaalude-induced spasms, culminating in a screaming slobbering "fight" between Belfort and his right-hand man Donnie Azoff ( Jonah Hill), writhing on the floor, wrapped in telephone cords. The montages give us not one second to breathe, let alone think or reflect. ![]() "The Wolf of Wall Street"'s rhythm is overwhelming, careening up and down and over like a rickety roller coaster car, punctured by hilarious asides (Rob Reiner's first entrance tells us everything about his character in 30 seconds), and wild pendulum swings from the professional to the personal. The scene between Chandler and DiCaprio, on the deck of Belfort's outrageous yacht, is a masterpiece of controlled tone, both actors circling one another warily, Chandler playing up his "I'm just a regular guy" schtick, allowing Belfort the space to expand his natural egomania, his contempt for regular guys like Chandler. The only "outside" eye here is in Kyle Chandler's cagey FBI agent, on Belfort's trail for years, waiting for him to slip up. Belfort was a natural salesman, with a spooky sixth sense about "the zeitgeist." There was a void to exploit in these penny stocks. He was an outsider from the dark underbelly of America, crawling out of the muck along with all the other confidence men, grifters, bottom-feeders. Jordan Belfort was not a titan of Wall Street. From the tulip mania in the 17th century, to the South Sea Bubble in the 18th century, to the Jazz Age mania of the 20th, to the housing bubble of the 21st, there will always be those who want in, who need in. There's a difference.Īny time the stock market overheats, a bubble of unreality opens up, and an entire culture "buys in," steeped in what we would now call FOMO, Fear of Missing Out. " The Third of May 1808 does not endorse the firing squad, of course. The man's death might mean something then. The man facing the firing squad is not presented as a glorious martyr to a worthy cause, which would provide at least some comfort to the audience. Goya's The Third of May 1808 was greeted with cries of outrage: the painting is so disturbing, and no moral is provided. There were probably some people who felt validated by "All in the Family" patriarch Archie Bunker's worldview, who didn't get the irony, who didn't understand the critique. I want that." That's not up to us to control, and it's not up to Scorsese to try to caution us away from it. Maybe someone would be inspired by Belfort, and watch his shenanigans and think, "That looks great. Don't do this," is offensive to those of us who love full immersion into other worlds, who love ambiguity, who love to be given lots of space as audience members. Wanting a film to include gigantic neon arrows pointing down, saying, "This behavior is bad. Why doesn't Scorsese make it more clear that Belfort and his cronies were sexist pigs? Scorsese clearly endorses this kind of behavior." Whether or not "The Wolf of Wall Street" "endorses" Belfort's behavior is the least interesting way to read the film. It could be boiled down to: "Where is the moral outrage? The final scene is so ambiguous. The furor around "The Wolf of Wall Street" (in terms of "the discourse") was familiar territory, and nothing new for Scorsese. The bell jar of "The Wolf of Wall Street" is total.Īnd therein lay the problem for many. But to Belfort et al, their behavior is not despicable. Belfort and his cronies are seen doing despicable things, not just to their clients, but to women, dwarves, flight attendants, wives. The voiceover calls to mind Ray Liotta's in " GoodFellas." We are co-conspirators. His tone overall is, "Can you believe the shit we got away with?" He strolls through the trading floor of his "firm," Stratton Oakmont, started in a garage on Long Island by a bunch of losers, reveling in his corruption, rolling in money and bullshit. Scorsese puts his film in Belfort's pocket, and Belfort ( Leonardo DiCaprio, in a career best) narrates, sometimes right in the middle of a scene. "The Wolf of Wall Street" is the story of Jordan Belfort, who pleaded guilty in 1999 to charges of stock market manipulation and fraud as the head of a bogus "firm" selling penny-stocks to suckers. ![]()
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