The ‘best’ Leonardo DiCaprio film is now streaming on Amazon Prime, over a decade after it was first released.
No, it’s not Titanic or Romeo + Juliet or even The Revenant (which is now over 10 years old, if you can believe it).
This comedy crime film was widely acclaimed at the time, and many thought it would secure DiCaprio, 51, his first Oscar.
The Wolf of Wall Street is based on the 2007 memoir of stockbroker Jordan Belfort, who made millions fraudulently and led a debauched lifestyle with it.
Directed by Martin Scorsese, the film sees DiCaprio as the millionaire playboy, while Jonah Hill plays business partner and friend Donnie Azoff.
Other key cast members include Matthew McConaughey, the late Rob Reiner, Joanna Lumley, and Margot Robbie in her breakthrough role.
The film follows Belfort as he sets up his own Wall Street business and becomes a multi-millionaire by the age of 25, exposing his erratic behaviour as he gained money and power.
Despite five Academy Award nominations — Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Screenplay — the film did not win.
It is, however, Scorsese’s highest-grossing film ever, making $392 million (£292 million) worldwide against a $100 million (£74.59 million) budget.
DiCaprio did land a Golden Globe for his performance, as well as winning the MTV Movie Awards’ ‘#WTF moment’, which he was also nominated for after Inception.
The film has gone down in history as one of DiCaprio’s greatest performances, although some have criticised it for glamorising Belfort’s life.
Brent Hankin praised: ‘Scorsese has always managed to elicit astounding performances from his actors, and his fifth collaboration with Leonardo DiCaprio results in one of the most charismatic, despicable, offensive and captivating characters to ever appear on screen.’
Diego Coda branded it the ‘best film of 2013’, adding ‘it was Oscar-worthy’ and ‘the acting is great’.
‘Leonardo DiCaprio is unbelievable, and this movie is his best performance,’ raved Alex Scott on IMDb.
The film sits at a healthy 79% critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes, while the audience score is even higher at 83%.
The Wolf of Wall Street might be a well-executed fever dream, but it has faced plenty of backlash too, especially as Belfort even had a cameo.
Scorsese was reportedly even heckled following a screening of the film at the Academy, with one screenwriter telling him: ‘Shame on you. Disgusting.’
In response, DiCaprio advised people to ‘sit through it’ before making any judgments.
‘I hope people understand we’re not condoning this behaviour, that we’re indicting it,’ he said at the time. ‘The book was a cautionary tale, and if you sit through the film, you’ll realise what we’re saying about these people and this world, because it’s an intoxicating one.’
‘At the end of the day, this was a reaction to what we see in our culture. It’s a timeless thing, the lust for wealth and money and power, but it’s done on such a massive scale nowadays, certainly after 2008.’
The Wolf of Wall Street is available to stream on Amazon Prime now.
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