I liked the movie, but mainly the comedy scenes, which I think make up a huge amount of the movie. I did not find it overlong at all, but I am watching it at home over a couple days, so it did not seem long at all.
I have zero idea how much is true and how much is just movie make-believe. I felt like I was watching a sequel to Catch Me If You Can…only a new con artist played by the same actor.
I find Martin Scorcese to be incredibly hit and miss, more than most famous directors. I have only liked a very small amount of his movies, so much so that I find his movies to be more miss than hit. I will now tell you what I’ve liked and disliked(revealing what I’ve seen).
I liked:
Wolf of Wall Street
Aviator
Hugo
Shutter Island - Uh, this one was only OK, a rare “OK” movie from him
Goodfellas - overrated, but a really good movie anyway.
Color of Money
Raging Bull - again overrated, but a pretty good movie
Didn’t like:
Departed - A total mess.
Gangs of New York - A total mess
Bringing Out The Dead - A total bore
Casino - A total bore
Anyway, I find him to be quite the productive director and I do not suggest my opinion comes out of seeing everything he’s done. Just an observation.
The Swiss banker stole the millions that they were stashing in Swiss banks after Nadine’s mother died. Since she was the one who opened the accounts, after her death the banker had sole control of the money and took it for himself. He was also banging Brad’s Czech wife who they were using as a courier. The point was that he was just as much of a thieving scuzzbag as they were and was skirting the law to steal from them much like they had done to all their investors.
They hated the Benihana guy because he got caught in a high profile insider trading scam that brought SEC attention to what Stratton Oakmont was doing with their “pump and dump” schemes.
Belfort is faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar to pretty to be a wolf of wall street. I worked in the markets in Tokyo and Hong Kong. Guys like Belfort look at least 10 years older than they are. And they never sit around being wistful, contemplative, etc. It was entertaining (but only somewhat since I saw a plane edited version), but didn’t really go for the jugular.
And now, solely and entirely because he filed this lawsuit, I know that Andrew Greene is a sufficiently scummy enough dude that they made an entire movie about how scummy he is. Which I would never have known, if he hadn’t sued.
Andrew Greene is claiming that the character Nicky Koskoff played by P.J. Byrne is based upon him. IMHO, this was a minor character, and all Greene did was point out that the scummy things that this character did were so close to things he actually did that we might confuse the two…well thanks for that.
