The Wolf Of Wall Street Review

The Wolf Of Wall Street is a film directed by Martin Scorsese  and stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jordan Belfort, Margot Robbie as Naomi Lapaglia, Jonah Hill as Donnie Azoff and Matthew McConaughey as Mark Hanna. The Wolf Of Wall Street is a film based on the true story of Jordan Belfort who was a wealthy stockbroker and business owner  during the 1980’s who became obsessed with money, drugs and sex.

The plot of The Wolf Of Wall Street follows mainly the character of Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) from a young age where he starts as stockbroker working with Mark Hanna (Matthew McConaughey) but Belfort quickly finds himself unemployed. Eventually Belfort finds new work where he notices an easy way to make money (through the sale of penny stocks). Belfort quickly starts exploiting all those he can into buying these stocks so that he can increase his wealth. As more money is obtained and gathered Belfort quickly falls for the attractions of drugs, sex (lot’s of hookers) and corrupts himself further and further. His lifestyle quickly attracts the attention of the FBI who launch investigations which threaten to ruin all Belfort has in this hedonistic lifestyle he has managed to create.

The movie through following the life of Jordan Belfort and his money seeking ambitions spends a long time justifying the wealth and status of rich people and makes many points about how the lifestyle is much better than those of working types such as the FBI agent Patrick Denham (Kyle Chandler). Drug use in this movie is so prevalent in its consumption that it’s standard practice with many of the characters, so much so that there seems to be no consequence for drug use and it’s shown to be an enhancement for ones ability to operate. The movie also has many and I mean many sex scenes, nude scenes and excessive party/orgy scenes that seem to fill up quite a lot of the 3 hour entertainment block you’ll get with The Wolf Of Wall Street. Even though The Wolf Of Wall Street does have these types of excessive scenes contained within the film, a lot of it does have context to each moment. Many of the excessive scenes are portrayed in lighthearted comedic way which make them more entertaining to watch.

The films main focus is around the character of Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) and a lot of the scenes such as the drug taking or the sex seeking moments add to the portrayal of the character as one obsessed with pleasure and self gratification. Leonardo DiCaprio was very impressive and convincing with his role in The Wolf Of Wall Street. At three hours long I did not get bored of his character and found all of his scenes and changes as the character grew to be excellent. But I did not feel the same about the rest of the cast.

Jonah Hill as Donnie Azoff in particular seemed to me to be the most annoying character I have seen at the cinema this year. I don’t know what people find appealing about Jonah Hill but opposite Leonardo DiCaprio I thought he was a little bit out of place here. Sure Jonah Hill can do some drug taking, sex crazed lunatic quite well but throughout the whole movie that’s all he was! For something that was 3 hours long, his character was awful.

Matthew McConaughey on the other hand was absolutely fantastic for his role but unfortunately he was only in the start of the movie with only just a bit more than two scenes. But, in those scenes, wow what a scene it was! Both McConaughey and DiCaprio were very impressive in this movie.

Margot Robbie who is actually an Australian actress that many will notice from Neighbours did very well in her role. Considering that it’s her first massive movie in the USA I think she was impressive and her accent was well done to. I thought Margot Robbie had good on screen chemistry with Leonardo DiCaprio and all their scenes were great with many dramatic moments. Margot Robbie presented herself very well on screen. Margot Robbie was absolutely stunning in The Wolf Of Wall Street and mixed in well with such a talented cast of characters.

As far as the style of this film goes being set in the 80’s, while watching it it didn’t fully stand out to me that it was set in this decade, I didn’t really feel the movie had  a distinct memorable style with clothing choices as compared to something like American Hustle which was much better with its look of its characters.

The directing by Martin Scorsese was quite well done which is expected considering his experience as a director and I think working with Leonoardo DiCaprio so much has done both men well as they seem to get good results out of each other. The pacing of the film was very good and even though it was three hours long the time passed quick for me when I viewed the film, it didn’t feel like a slow paced film, scenes are short, funny and crazy.

However I do feel that this movie is heavily carried by the performance of Leonardo DiCaprio who was phenomenal in this role as Jordan Belfort. It’s the screenplay that brings the film down in part because other characters are not as focused or well portrayed. Jonah Hill is the second most seen character and he was awful, McConaughey was great but only had a brief appearance with his screen time. Margot Robbie (Naomi Lapaglia) had some depth to her character towards the end and was good, but, the film seems to me to be lacking that wow factor, yes Leo was great, but there isn’t much else in there. That is of course unless massive amounts of nudity, crazy parties and characters taking drugs is your wow factor, they do make good time fillers though.

Overall The Wolf Of Wall Street is a very entertaining movie to watch. I was not bored throughout my session and even though I do complain about some elements of the movie, I was impressed and kept interested in the plot and the story of Jordan Belfort. This movie is definitely one to see for any Leonardo DiCaprio fan and it has many funny moments that should make most people laugh at least a few times during the viewing. It does have its dramatic elements as well and if just looking at the Belfort character alone which is very excessive times, it was interesting to watch. The Wolf Of Wall Street does well to follow Jordan Belfort’s journey and portray the benefits and downsides of a life of excess and what it may do to a person over time.

The Wolf Of Wall Street comes out January 23 in Australia and is currently showing in the United States