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Yeah, more than anything he's lamenting contemporary film criticism for not applying a higher standard of interpretation of film language - a standard that was seen abundantly in the past when approaching the films of Cocteau, Bergman, Fellini, etc. But then American filmmakers have always seemed to be shortchanged by their contemporary critics, unless like Kubrick in his later career they come across as pseudo-European.

Disabuse yourselves of any notion of the haphazard. None of this is coincidence. These decisions are not arbitrary. They are the considered associations of a deeper mind and heart than your own, meditating in close collaboration with an unparalleled phalanx of consummate craftsmen. And yes, even the appearance of Steve Urkel in a hot air balloon is no accident. Never mind that the scene in question concerns an average working man’s fear of heights. Never mind that Urkel says, “One pull for up. Two for down!" suggesting that when you're full of hot air it takes less effort to rise than fall. All you really need to know is that the show is called “Family Matters”.

I hope your friend is young enough to justify, well, everything he's doing in this paragraph, for instance. The whole overlong essay is a noble attempt at poetical film criticism but it reads as parody, a poor imitation of those who have the confidence in their views and their take on a film to not resort to flowery proclamations of the absolute artistry of film as passed down on high from the cinematic gods. What some are picking up on as "Armond-ish" is just plain Romantic arrogance masquerading as insight.

(No ill will towards your friend, of course-- Hopefully he'll one day write something free of the artificial constraints he's placed on his prose and insights here)

He's not a professional reviewer by any means, and as far as I know he has no professional experience or higher education in journalism. Simply an enthusiast of film art. This was after all a post on his facebook page primarily for his friends. I shared it (with his permission) because of the ideas it addresses, not for any literary or structural purposes. In fact, he's very aware of his shortcomings. He'd much rather the professional writers step up their game and use their talents to write these things than him, but he was frustrated by so little detailed analysis of the film in the professional criticism world.

domino harvey wrote:I was going to ask this hypothetically but a quick Google search tells me my suspicion was right: This is now the record holder for most uses of the word "Fuck" in a narrative film, with 506 instances

522 by latest count, and here they are. Not fucking safe for fucking work, obviously. Spoilery too.

I wouldn't have thought you could synthesize a three hour movie into three and a half minutes, but that was pretty effective. It really is hugely spoiler-y, so don't watch if you haven't seen the whole movie yet

Looking at it that way, the profanity (well, the f-word anyway) only takes up about 2.5% of the running time!

Much has been made of this new record, but I honestly didn't even notice how prevalent the usage was in the film. I guess the language felt so much a part of who these characters were that the repetition went unnoticed by me.

I'm curious about how they are going to edit this down for basic cable, if they even try. It seems every major theatrical release winds up somewhere on basic after it's done cycling on HBO/Showtime/Starz/Epix/Netflix, but I wonder if cutting something like this would be virtually impossible. Same can be said for Fincher's Girl With The Dragon Tattoo which has some stuff that's too hot for basic but often it's scenes important to the narrative.

Roger Ryan wrote:Looking at it that way, the profanity (well, the f-word anyway) only takes up about 2.5% of the running time!

Much has been made of this new record, but I honestly didn't even notice how prevalent the usage was in the film. I guess the language felt so much a part of who these characters were that the repetition went unnoticed by me.

Same here, until I announced that it was "so fuckin' cold" outside on our walk across the theater parking lot after the movie let out, and surprised myself with my newly foul mouth.

Yeah, you never would have said that before seeing The Wolf of Wall Street. I got soap right in there as soon as we got home, don't anyone worry

mfunk9786 wrote:Yeah, you never would have said that before seeing The Wolf of Wall Street. I got soap right in there as soon as we got home, don't anyone worry

hahaha, I don't frequently make use of such expletives casually, is all I'm saying.

flyonthewall2983 wrote:I'm curious about how they are going to edit this down for basic cable, if they even try. It seems every major theatrical release winds up somewhere on basic after it's done cycling on HBO/Showtime/Starz/Epix/Netflix, but I wonder if cutting something like this would be virtually impossible. Same can be said for Fincher's Girl With The Dragon Tattoo which has some stuff that's too hot for basic but often it's scenes important to the narrative.

They can just hire the amazing voice actors who overdubbed Die Hard 2 for TBS

LQ wrote:

mfunk9786 wrote:Yeah, you never would have said that before seeing The Wolf of Wall Street. I got soap right in there as soon as we got home, don't anyone worry

hahaha, I don't frequently make use of such expletives casually, is all I'm saying.

I'd expect that kind of language at Denny's, but not here

They could also just go with the basic cable "Do the Right Thing" classic insert, "Mickey Fickey." I've Mickey Ficked so many Mickey Fickers so many Mickey Fickin' times. That phrase is useful as a Mickey Ficker.

I don't know that too many basic cable channels are looking to air a 3 hour movie to begin with, especially in this day and age when Paramount has so many options for places to make The Wolf of Wall Street. My guess would be that it'll air on premium cable, be available for streaming, and that'll be it.

One of the essential requirements to be an artist of merit is to have an identity, a signature if you will. Martin Scorsese, perhaps more than anybody else in his field, is certainly an example of an artist who has carved out an identity. The tricky thing about having an identity is that once your audience gets used to what you're doing, unless you come up with new tricks you're going to one predictable, at times silly, old dog.

With The Wolf of Wall Street Scorsese does nothing new. Love him or hate him this film is the ultimate indulgence of all things Scorsese, memorable lead role, a snappy edited fast pace, set pieces covered in long sleek tracking shots, slow motion to drive our attention, snappy dialogue riddled with curse words, characters losing themselves deep inside their vices encrusted within an underlying admiration for them. Yep, there's no doubt who gave Matthew McConaughey his masturbation line because this film was all about Scorsese loving himself and lets be real, who doesn't enjoy jerking oneself off? Thing is tho all this is done without really saying much but maybe that's the point, maybe the idea as Pauline Kael irritatingly championed way back when, is to entertain and in that The Wolf of Wall Street entertains, boy does it ever. Now will I ever remember anything else about the film besides that? Probably not. Given the subject matter is that reason enough to knock the movie? Maybe, but that's not something I'm particularly interested in doing, I've gotta go sign up for the Series 7.

domino harvey wrote:What some are picking up on as "Armond-ish" is just plain Romantic arrogance masquerading as insight.

Hold on for a second, I think you're being far too harsh. It takes a fair amount of courage to post something like that on facebook and even more so to post on a place like this one. There's nothing arrogant about that, nor is it masquerading as anything but one person's views on a film and what he perceives to be a wrongheaded reaction to that film. There's nothing wrong with challenging his views or to dislike his tone but to say that his piece was 'masquerading as insight' is the worst kind off arrogance, or "Armond-ish", that you yourself are accusing him of being.

Black Hat wrote:With The Wolf of Wall Street Scorsese does nothing new.

I'm not so sure that it's fair to say this. I mean, yes, The Wolf of Wall Street is full of Scorsese's trademarks and his style: the fast editing, the tracking shots, the dialogue, etc. Thematically, it most definitely has a kinship with Goodfellas and Casino, sharing the whole "rise and fall" narrative.

However, in terms of the film's tone and atmosphere, I think what Scorsese established here stands out pretty uniquely among his other films. It's by far his most over the top, excessive film, almost in a surrealistic manner. I think Thelma Schoonmaker put it best when she claimed that she was surprised by all of the comparisons to Goodfellas; among Scorsese's other works, it most significantly relates to After Hours.

And I also think that Scorsese also really managed to find a great balance between pushing the film's excess to the extreme and the necessity for important, character-driven dialogue sequences (think of Matthew McConaughey's moment, or Kyle Chandler's scene on the yacht).

Black Hat wrote:

domino harvey wrote:What some are picking up on as "Armond-ish" is just plain Romantic arrogance masquerading as insight.

Hold on for a second, I think you're being far too harsh. It takes a fair amount of courage to post something like that on facebook and even more so to post on a place like this one. There's nothing arrogant about that, nor is it masquerading as anything but one person's views on a film and what he perceives to be a wrongheaded reaction to that film. There's nothing wrong with challenging his views or to dislike his tone but to say that his piece was 'masquerading as insight' is the worst kind off arrogance, or "Armond-ish", that you yourself are accusing him of being.

It's a typical reaction, and seems to have touched a nerve with him here and other threads.

For me this film continues Scorsese's run since Shutter Island where he seems to be having fun, just fucking around.

As for the "fucks per minute" - perhaps I'm used to that when seeing films of Scorsese, but I hadn't noticed it's use in this film. Furthermore, after reading a friend's review which discussed the use of the word in other films, I don't remember having a reaction either way with those films. I've seen Summer of Sam half a dozen times, and the use of the word "fuck" is not even close to the first things that come to mind.

The one time I noted it's use in a movie was in the hilarious scene from Midnight Run where DeNiro calls Joey Pants from the FBI office.

This was the perfect vehicle to flush his system as he heads into production for Silence. Religous persecution awaits.

In the past, Scorsese's made it clear that he's against releasing multiple cuts of a film, but perhaps he didn't have a say this time around. EDIT: This story is WRONG. (see posts below)

hearthesilence wrote:In the past, Scorsese's made it clear that he's against releasing multiple cuts of a film, but perhaps he didn't have a say this time around.

Not actually happening.

That's good to know! I've come to agree with him on this issue - it's ridiculous to put out multiple cuts, not unless you're doing a restoration job that's fixing a past wrong.

jindianajonz wrote:I guess I'm in the minority in that I didn't really care for Jonah Hill in this film. He started out decently enough in his early scenes, but as the film went on I felt he slowly but surely devolved into the same typecast Hill character that I've seen in Superbad and This is the End, complete with his trademark mocking sincerity (A trait that This is the End played up very well). Or to put it another way, diCaprio had me convinced that he was Jordan Belcourt, but once drugs came into the picture I never forgot that I was watching Jonah Hill.

This is a good point. I've praised DiCaprio's performance in this to everyone I know, but for some reason Jonah Hill--despite the attention he's gotten so far in the media for his performance--had slipped my mind when discussing the performances with friends and family. And you articulated just why his perfomance may not have stuck with me as much--I really did feel like I was just watching the "same" Jonah Hill at times. In a way I guess he can't help it--he has this portly put-upon type about him that is hard to shake in every film, and it's obvious directors play off that when they use him. I didn't think he was bad, though. I just don't think he was stretched as everyone says he was.

As for whether Scorsese condones these characters' action or not, I feel like that's too simplistic a view to take. I think Scorsese is very aware of the allure of this kind of lifestyle and doesn't necessarily look at them with a moralizing or judgemental eye. I think he's more interested in exploring the idea of people going way past the socially acceptable limit...of ambition and appetites left unchecked rather than what they're doing is "right" or "wrong." Scorsese also definitely acknowledges that people like Belfort will always have an advantage over others simply because of how ambitious and charismatic and aggressive they are. The chilling ending more than anything seems to suggest that Belfort, for all he's lost, will land on his feet and thrive in his new role as a "motivational" speaker (and from what I hear, Belfort really is doing quite well). These types of people know what they want and they go out and get it. It's a jungle out there and the predators that hunt the best, thrive the most. I think some of the jungle beats, chants, and animal references that are evoked throughout the film alludes more to this rather than what some have interpreted as Scorsese criticizing their baser instincts. To a certain degree, I think Scorsese can even empathize with Belfort's unquenchable rage to succeed from a status and materialistic standpoint...but also suggesting perhaps you have to be a sociopath to do what Belfort did and go as far as he does. I think most people usually are hardwired with something in their brains that stops them from going past a certain limit, whether it be socially or legally. I guess this makes this a very cynical film, but that's hardly a bad thing in my mind. Scorsese has said in interviews that he wanted to keep pushing the limit in this film...always asking himself if he was going too far. But for Belfort, there were no limits. Nothing was "going too far" for him. And there's something very dangerous but very attractive about the idea of going as far as you can without a mental stopper telling you "is this too much?"

Blu-ray specs have been announced: no alternate cut or deleted scenes are included

Excellent visual essay on the structure and purpose of the film