Back to what Marty does best

Rating: Null/10 (4 January 2014)

Perhaps a review will be better-timed if I get to watch the actual theatrical version that played in normal geographies. Forgive me if I my opinion loses whatever's been lost in translation. This is pure Scorsese-schlock, even vintage Scorsese (not when he veers off-track, in a good way, expanding his range, like he did with 'Hugo', and to a lesser extent, with 'The departed'). Cases in point - Casino, Goodfellas, The Aviator. The first thing I think of when I'm asked to sum up my impressions of this one in a word? EXCESS. Main character engaged in excess? Check. Lots of swearing? Check (not that he tosses them in gratuitously - everything has a purpose). Bimbo wives with brains that can get nasty? Check. Hard-to-look-at+hard-to-look-away-from bursts of sudden, misogynistic violence? Check. Scorsese does what he does best, as does Dicaprio (his pay phone sequence - one of the best to be committed on celluloid, though knowing how snippy the censors were, I'd be hard-pressed to know if I saw it in its entirety), and this could well be the spiritual sequel to 'The Aviator'. Dicaprio's fantastic (I don't really know how well this performance compares with Ejiofor's), but this is Not really stretching the range he's displayed in 'The Aviator', 'Inception', 'The departed' or 'Shutter Island' (I hear range's something Will Forte has exhibited in 'Nebraska'). My recommendation - Watch it, preferably on the big screen, certainly in a normal market/country. If you don't have that option, ............................... there's really no point watching it.