“The Wolf of Wall Street” is another demonstration of Martin Scorsese’s great craft as a filmmaker who delivers cinema with a punch after nearly half a century in the business. On the other hand, it’s essentially “Goodfellas II.” Our protagonist is an amoral man of great ambition. No time is wasted deconstructing our psychopathic hero. We are simply fed the narration of a person whose only regrets are not in the things he’s done, but what he failed to get away with. Once again, Scorsese also controversially bases the film on the memoir of someone who stands to benefit from a story of bad deeds they committed. I wonder if Scorsese waits in confession booths to figure out future projects.
Jordon Belfort’s memoir inspired “The Sopranos” writer Terrence Winter’s screenplay about the greed and excess of a self-made Wall Street tycoon who was eventually indicted and imprisoned for fraud and embezzlement (but is currently successful as a motivational speaker). Leonardo DiCaprio plays Belfort effectively within his limitations. The movie augments his stories of drug-addicted hedonistic activities among wealthy colleagues such as his business partner, Donnie Azoff, played with loathsome hilarity by Jonah Hill. Their outrageous scenes together are among the best and funniest in the movie. I laughed a lot.
The same cannot be said for later scenes between DiCaprio and Margot Robbie, a gorgeous actress who plays his second wife. She creates a perfectly seductive performance but inevitably must become antagonistic later in the film. That’s where her character becomes boring.
If there’s anything I’ve resented about Scorsese, it is how he needlessly dwells on jerks and their trophy wives when their superficial relationships crumble. The scenes between DiCaprio and Margot Robbie screaming at one another are no different than those between Robert De Niro and Sharon Stone in “Casino” or Ray Liotta and Lorraine Bracco in “Goodfellas.” There’s little depth to their long arguments. They’re just tedious. They also pale in comparison to the hilarity achieved between Christian Bale and Jennifer Lawrence in a similarly miserable relationship featured in the recent “American Hustle.”
The majority of this movie is well made, but it could have used a little trimming. The last thing I heard was that Scorsese was not perfectly satisfied by the final edit, but that could have been misinformation.
The unfair controversy that comes with films like this is through the idea that scumbags are being glorified. Fascination shouldn’t be mistaken for admiration. Sure, there will always be fools who want to be Scarface or someone of the sort (despite the fact that these characters tend to be defeated). This is an age-old argument about life imitating art and art imitating life – whose responsible for all these bad people?
If you are looking for something friendly and unchallenging, look no further than Ben Stiller’s “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.” It is no masterpiece, but there are moments when it has such potential. It is a gorgeously-shot comfort film. I actually enjoyed it. There are many reasons to doubt a Stiller vehicle, but not when he’s the one at the wheel – directing, that is. I think that he’s always had talent in this area. The visual ambition in each of his films leaves imagery ingrained in ones memory. This is even true of “The Cable Guy.” Stiller likes using very intensely shot imagery for comic effect, and it works a lot of the time.
This film, very loosely based on an old short-story that has gone through all kinds of incarnations, follows the adventures of a daydreamer (Stiller) who has been sparked with enough ambition to go on a REAL adventure. As an employee for Life Magazine, he is tasked with finding a missing photo for their final issue. The picture’s freelance photographer (Sean Penn) may be the only person who knows of its whereabouts and is said to be across the world in a remote location. Driven by the encouragement of a love interest (Kristen Wiig), Mitty embarks on a journey.
The movie, while about the finding of a photographer, is clearly in love with film itself – and if my eyes don’t lie, it is definitely shot on film. Cinematographer Stuart Dryburgh captures the National Geographic-like splendor of the beautiful locations (mostly in Iceland).
On the downside, the story could stand to be a little deeper, and is pitifully dependent on product placement, even though Stiller tries to make the products work with the story and its comedy. These were still things that I could live with. It’s not a repeat-view film, but it wasn’t a waste of my time either.
“The Wolf of Wall Street” is like a Filet Mignon with a few too many sides, some undesirable. “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” is a Happy Meal.
Bennett Duckworth is a film fanatic who lives in Louisville and goes to see a movie in the theater at least once a week. He has kept a movie review blog since September of 2011 with the mission of writing about every new release he sees, as well as new trends in filmmaking and classic films he loves. You can read more of his reviews at www.bennettduckworth.blogspot.com.