The Wolf of Wall Street

Martin Scorsese is a rare director. When it comes to overall filmography-quality, the guy lacks any middle-ground. His praise is either rightly deserved or incredibly overrated. MEANSTREETS, TAXI DRIVER, RAGING BULL, THE KING OF COMEDY, THE LAST TEMPTATION, GOODFELLAS and CASINO, are just a few of his deservedly high-praised features; while GANGS OF NEW YORK, THE DEPARTED and SHUTTER ISLAND are all incredibly overrated. Notice how the rightly praised films are all pre-1996, while all his overrated films are post-1996. So, where, you might ask, does that leave THE WOLF OF WALL STREET? It appears Scorsese has climbed his way out of a slump to create a highly realistic portrayal of Wall Street corruption, with this tale revolving mainly around security-fraud. The memoir of the same name by Jordan Belfort (played by DiCaprio) was a huge inspiration to Ben Younger for his 2000 debut film BOILER ROOM, which is an excellent film in its own right starring late-1990s up-and-comers, but what WOLF delivers that BOILER ROOM lacks is what I'm coining as "genre gumbo"—and if you do yourself a favor and watch WOLF, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about… not to say that you shouldn't do yourself a second favor and also watch BOILER ROOM. Hilarious, cruel and intense; WOLF OF WALL STREET is an epic that is in full-speed from the very first shot, and ceases to slow down until the end credits. Easily Scorsese's best in almost 20 years! However, CASINO has had the privilege of having 19-years to grow on viewers; who knows what WOLF's replay value could be… for all we know, it could be the best thing Scorsese has done since RAGING BULL. Only time will tell where it ranks on the Scorsese-classics (definitely higher than lower on the impressively long list); but one thing is for certain, there is no denying it is an immediate classic and possibly the best film of 2013.