The world of investing can be a jungle. Bulls. Bears. Danger at every turn. That’s why we at Stratton Oakmont pride ourselves on being the best. Trained professionals to guide you through the financial wilderness. Stratton Oakmont. Stability. Integrity. Pride.
The Wolf of Wall Street starts with this advertisement of Stratton Oakmont which is obviously ironic and it sets the tone for the entire movie. Jordan on his first day as a legal Stockbroker claims that day to be his first day as king of the universe, the firm closes on that very day. Later on in the movie Jordan’s wife catches him cheating on her, you find Jordan saying ”I felt terrible… two weeks later I filed for divorce”, or even Belfort’s so called emotional speech to his Strattonites when he was forced to leave Stratton, man literally drops off the plan of leaving the firm, after a whole long emotional speech, this irony keeps going throughout the runtime.
I just love the way this film is narrated just like every other Scorsese antihero Belfort is also telling a cautionary tale but even while doing that living up to his reputation of a fraud he deceives the audiences at many places like for instance the qualuude drive home sequence, Jordan makes us believe that he reached to the home safely without harming anything or anyone, he lies straight to our face even while narrating his story.
Scorsese’s direction is truly magnificent here, possibly the best he has done in this century, he didn’t hold anything back in presenting a cautionary about some lunatic Salesman.
I just love how he uses some really subtle nuances that indicates the happenings in the film.
For instance the hummmig which Hanna does with Jordan showing him the ropes (cocaine and hookers) after that, his great rise begins, and while getting to the climax we see Belfort doing the humming to his Strattonites, like he has exceeded Hanna, after that very Humming, Belfort’s catastrophic downfall begins.
Also, the fact that Scorsese shows two women, both the prosecutor and the judge fining and sentencing Jordan to the prison in a movie where women is merely shown as an object for Stockbrokers’ desire is absolutely praiseworthy. I just love the way Scorsese uses the dark humour throughout the movie like I have always said no filmmaker understands the human behaviour better than Martin, offensive humour is low-key enjoyed by most of us so he keeps throwing it at us again and again without even being apologetic about it.
Camerawork is absolutely top notch, several instances show how different camera tricks are done according to the situation in the movie, be it Jordan rolling over the steps where there were originally 6 steps but Jordan’s intoxicated mind was seeing was seeing way more some Christopher Nolan level surrealism by Martin Scrosese lol, or the final scene where Denham comes to take Jordan to jail, the camera angle makes Denham appear on the top despite him being downstairs and Jordan despite being upstairs appears dwarfed, everything is done with perfection.
The soundtrack of the movie is absolutely glittering, each and every track is used very smartly which complements all the scenes impeccably well, also, if you notice there’s no
soundtrack or score in the Jordan-Noami fight sequence towards the end, indicating that nothing is funny or amusing anymore.
The crisp editing and super tight screenplay make us crave for more in the film even after the long runtime of 3 hrs.
Talking about the performances Leonardo DiCaprio as Jordan Belfort is easily his career best performance and one of the best acting performances of the last decade, I can’t praise him enough for the performance, Margot and Jonah Hill are just phenomenal in their respective characters, I wish there were some more sequences of Mark Hanna, I wanted to see more of him, that might be my only complaint from the film.
Also, is it just me or Jordan holding Naomi from behind, in that famous I will not die sober sequence looks like a twisted mirroring of that Titanic sequence when Jack holds Rose from behind?!
Ritesh has only two passions in life: movies and writing. With over two years of professional writing experience, he goes beyond SEO norms to convey his unfiltered love for cinema. A devoted admirer of Martin Scorsese, Ritesh believes that cinema is the most powerful storytelling medium on the planet, and through his words, he seeks to share that passion with the world.