Wolf of Wall Street was gruesome yet fantastic

Rating: 9/10 (1 October 2014)

The Wolf of Wall Street Review
Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street is probably one of the most gruesome yet enjoyable movies ever screened; film critic Matt Zoller Seitz even said it was "one of the most entertaining films ever made about loathsome men" (Seitz). That is the perfect quote to introduce what should be the general consensus for this movie: it was disturbingly fantastic. This movie contained a myriad of inappropriate scenes including drug use of a long lost drug (now banned by the United States government) called "Quaaludes". Aside from the main characters Jordan Belfort and his friend Donnie popping Quaaludes almost every other scene, viewers also see the use of cocaine, alcohol consumption, prostitution, and explicit language. The movie probably goes a maximum of five minutes without seeing any one of those activities occur, which is why I use the word "disturbingly" to modify how fantastic the movie was. However, many people just saw the gruesome activities in the movie and could not look past them and see the main details of the film. A lot of people bought tickets to The Wolf of Wall Street expecting something completely different than what they got. When they viewed the movie, it seems all they saw was the inappropriate drug use, prostitution, explicit language, etc. Lou Lumenick of the New York Post wrote "If you're going to invest three hours watching a movie about a convicted stock swindler, it needs to be a whole lot more compelling than Martin Scorsese's handsome, sporadically amusing and admittedly never boring — but also bloated, redundant, vulgar, shapeless and pointless — Wolf of Wall Street" (Lumenick). Lumenick seems to represent a large consensus of average reviewers who thought The Wolf of Wall Street was overblown and redundant at most parts. But what these viewers failed to see in this movie was the fact that it is NOT about Wall Street alone. It is actually an account of the life of Jordan Belfort, who even wrote a book which was the inspiration for this movie. Belfort's book described his life of lavish partying and addiction to Quaaludes, which was the inspiration for the heavy use of them in this movie.
It is unfortunate many people cannot see that the plot of this movie is centered on the man Jordan Belfort and that they expect to see a more detailed account of what it is like to be a broker on Wall Street. Maybe they need to start being more realistic and stop judging books by their covers because The Wolf of Wall Street is much more than a nearly three hour fun-fest of drugs, sex, and swindling money from people. It is an actual account of the life of Jordan Belfort, whom Leonardo DiCaprio depicted beautifully. His acting was exquisite, and the style he did it with was beautiful. He acted with an intensity and passion that any DiCaprio fan would expect. But going back to the original point: despite being packed with all the gruesome activity, the movie was overall fascinating and well worth the 179-minute viewing. Yes, it is quite long, but it is so detailed that it is nearly impossible to get bored at any point during the movie. The movie gets so detailed at certain points that viewers are able to delve into Belfort's initial thoughts when he meets his good friend Donnie Azoff. The fact that the movie included the thoughts on Jordan regarding Donnie's teeth is kind of incredible because it is an extreme type of detail which no other director would be able to make work. Scorsese's work in this movie was top notch, comparable to many of his other highly regarded films, like Taxi Driver and Gangs of New York. Oh and by the way, Taxi Driver included a highly controversial role of an underage prostitute played by Jodie Foster, yet it received several Oscar nominations. So for those critics who disagree with Scorsese adding all the use of prostitution in The Wolf of Wall Street, just look back to Taxi Driver. He made it work then, and he has made it work again. So despite many people being so opposed to the highly inappropriate aspects of The Wolf of Wall Street, it is pretty obvious that all anyone has to do is look past the title of the movie and set real expectation for this movie. From there, this movie is nothing but fantastic. The Wolf of Wall Street deserves nothing but praise for its accurate depiction of Jordan Belfort's life, but mostly for its extreme attention to detail and its ability to never get boring. David Thomson of New Republic described it perfectly: "This is a film by Martin Scorsese, not just the funniest he has ever made but the first in which there is an authentic daring" (Thomson). The Wolf of Wall Street is a film that deserves high praise and recognition.