The Wolf of Wall Street - "That's America man!"

Rating: 8/10 (27 January 2014)

This is a great film – a class act.
However, the 'blogomentary' about whether Jordan Belfort was a scumbag or not or whether this film glorifies his real-life escapades is missing the point. Scorcese's and DiCaprio's achievement with this epic, monumentally amoral cinematic portrayal of American decadence, degeneracy and depravity is immense and - oddly or not - immensely satisfying.
It is a film after all; first and foremost it should be viewed in this light, albeit one that is truly deserving of an Oscar for Marty and for Leo (and I would argue, for the screenplay and possibly a few other categories to boot, (e.g. production design, cinematography).
And if we think Belfort is a "scumbag lowlife" who just happened to live the high life at the expense of others, it's scary to think that there are not only plenty more "Belforts" out there like him, but that they are - individually - even bigger "scumbag lowlifes" than him. And collectively? Well, let's not even go there shall we?
In the end, Belfort was a bit player, a bottom feeder in the Great Ponzi Scheme that is Wall Street. At least he got to pay a penalty (of sorts, anyways). Which is much more than we can say about the bigger, much more amoral "scumbags" that brought the financial system of the world to the brink, and most of whom (Bernanke, Summers, Geithner anyone?) were called in by firstly Bush Two – and his Judas-goat successor, Obama – to 'fix' the system after it went pear shaped. To paraphrase one of the characters in The Wire when questioned why players kept allowing the character 'Snotboogie' in the neighbourhood crap-game despite his penchant for skimming the booty and scamming the other players - he replied, "that's America, man!"
And without a radical revolution in the way America 'manages' its wholly dysfunctional financial system just for starters - not to mention a complete overhaul of the anomalous values and warped ideals underpinning the much touted 'American Dream' that seem to inhibit anything remotely resembling institutional reform – the "Belforts" will just keep on a-coming. Without that aforementioned reform, it will be like playing "Whack-a-Mole"!
For every 'chancer' like Jordan Belfort, there are a 10,000+ suckers, marks and mugs out there inhabiting the American Dreamscape who will readily buy into someone else's get rich quick scheme/scam because they are unable to resist the siren call that soundtracks that Dreamscape". If we allow it to do so, Scorsese's achievement lets us reflect on that unnerving, disturbing reality, and maybe, just maybe, give some of us pause about where we are going and what we are prepared to do to get there.
In simple terms, this is one of the best films I've seen in years - as acidic social commentary and darkly, pitch-black satire alone it works a treat, and then some. After much of the dross we get inundated with that passes for quality storytelling/filmmaking, to some degree it has restored my faith in the ability of the movie business to actually make films that mean something and are relevant to the modern world. Indeed, WOWS is one of modern cinema's greatest amorality tales, although I'm not sure that was what Scorsese intended.
As for entertainment, well I for one was royally entertained. For those who do view it and feel the same way and yet might be worried by that, then maybe you should view it as a "guilty pleasure". It works for me. For that matter I didn't realize Scorcese had such a flair for comedy. I was pissing myself at some of the scenes.
For further deliberations on the American Dream not too far removed from Belfort and his cohort - and other amorality tales from the Land of the Doodle Dandies - go here.
http://poxamerikana.wordpress.com - then Search "State of the Disunion Part 1"