The Wolf of Wall Street

The only thing I liked was the pen selling scene.

(It reminded me of my own interview 25 years back. The Interviewer gave me his ball pen and told me to sell it to him. I could not and was rejected)

Had I watched this movie 25 years back, I probably could have learnt and got that job.

 

I've read Wolf on Wall St and i'm reading Catching the Wolf on Wall St now (I have down time at work sometimes so I found them free on website and I read them at work. Jordan Belfort is still making millions from public speaking and his books when he still owes his victims money so I would never actually spend money on that garbage). I can't really speak for the movie but the book was also over the top and decadent because Jordan Belfort's life was over the top and decadent.

He makes himself out to be quite likeable in the books, done on purpose to cast himself in a sympathetic light i'm sure but he's probably also a pretty charismatic character - you can't really do what he did without having natural charisma. I know Dicaprio and Scorcese worked with him while making the movie, I'm guessing they both liked him and therefore instead of making a movie which casts a moral judgement, wanted to make a movie that merely skims the surface and shows how much fun he had through the whole experience.

 

Heard a lot of mixed reviews about this - seems it's a loved it/hated it kinda film with not much room for average. Will check it out this weekend and report back...

 

yeah, Wahlberg surprised me in that film as well. The Departed was an excellent film, i agree.

 

just 'cause it's based on a true story doesn't mean that what's shown to you actually happened.

there was no acting happening in any of those scenes. dialogue was retarded. a chimpanzee could've been standing there and done a better job of acting. i'm not trashing DiCaprio here though. it wasn't in his acting skills, it was a lousy script.

American Hustle was great. it was a work of genius. one of the best films i've ever seen.

 

It makes you talk about, so it was successful. LOL

 

i talked to my buddy about how a guy working for a company i know got laid off in a day. doesn't make that guy successful. it's just something to express opinion about.

or you know how you go to a groceries store and buy a cake? and then you go home and start eating that cake and turns out it was made with rotten cream and cranberries....you express what a crap of a cake it is too. next day you go to that store and give them a piece of your mind (and there you have the right to even get your money back). would you call that cake a successful cake?

this film is something like that. only my opinion doesn't reflect the success or non-success of the film. i say it's rotten, but some people might love the rotten taste.

 

I'm with the dissenting minority who think that The Departed was extremely overrated.

I am a Scorsese fan, btw.

 

I didn't mean to derail this thread... getting back to Wolf of Wall Street...

 

don't worry. i don't mind thread derails. it was on a related note anyways.

 

The whole thing fell completely apart for me at the first yacht scene. I don't know what horrible song was playing, but it made the whole thing seem like a cheap cruise commercial. It reminded me of Gangs of New York where there is that techno fight scene. I don't know what Martin Scorcese is thinking with his choices of music, but he should think again.

 

If we're ok with the thread derail, what's your favorite Scorsese pic? Mine is Taxi Driver. Deniro and Scorsese were both absolutely on top of their game!

 

yeah, true.....

 

i'm younger than the core of Scorsese cult generation (i think....). in any case, his early films completely passed me by (read: i haven't seen them).

i'd have to say i have two: The Departed and Shutter Island.

 

Holey shit!

 

I don't really get the whole Taxi Driver thing. Of his moodier films; I find Raging Bull much more enjoyable.
Taxi Driver comes off as bland to me; but many films of that time period do..

I love Goodfellas and the Age of Innocence the most of his works; but Gangs of New York has a special place in my heart because of Daniel Day-Lewis' awesome performance.

 

you obviously have zero experience in finance in wall st because while somewhat exaggerated at times, its totally true to form.

 

That's what Wall Street does is make papes. Those guys know how to use the system to their advantage!

 

they certainly do. when i worked as executive assistant to the portfolio manager (main boss) of a small hedge fund ($345 mn in assets under his mgmt)… i made 50k base salary, full bennies, and a minimum of $5k in bonus money every month. thats 9k per month. and i was on the low low low end of the totem pole.

a mediocre guy will take home 12k per month, monthly bonuses 10-30k (modest), quarterly bonuses (250k+ depending on their contract), annual bonuses (I've seen 500k +) AND (and not or) a performance bonus which is usually several hundred thousand dollars.

and they're all crazy, they're all crazy

 

i do have zero experience in Wall Street/finance. never been there, don't wanna be. (i do have experience in film-making however).

but that's not what i was saying was not believable (which i can't speak for since i don't know), not that they ventured into showing how Wall Street or finance operates anyway. the actors did not make me believe that they were guys on the Wall Street, doing drugs (drug use was unrealistic). i didn't even understand that they were bankrupting the people they sold shares to. i found out about that little bit from a review on the film later. exactly, i do not know what is done on Wall Street, so the film on the subject of Wall Street should take at least a minimum effort to explain what is being done and how it works. this was not explained in this film. you may have been able to fill in the blanks because you have experience with it, but to someone like me, this film may as well have been made in Chinese and it would have made no difference.

and there was no film-making here. the whole thing was a repetition of just a few identical elements for three hours long. no plot development, character development, nothing. the film-making was nonexistent.

and, by the way, i read they had to cut the film to three hours before release, because it was too long.... it was longer than three hours initially. this, actually, is the reduced version. i can't imagine how long the director's cut on DVD is gonna be like. longer and with more porn.

and i stumbled upon this interesting thing:

http://www.laweekly.com/informer/2013/12/26/an-open-letter-to-the-makers-of-the-wolf-of-wall-street-and-the-wolf-himself