Martin Scorsese’s early work is undeniable cinema excellence. It’s easy to log the early classics like Taxi Driver (1976) and Raging Bull (1980) on Letterboxd with five-star ratings without losing one’s credibility. The consensus is strong and endures, and to go against the grain decades later and claim that, say, Travis Bickle isn’t actually one of the greatest fictional characters ever created is foolish. But what to do about the late-career works whose reputations aren’t as settled in the culture? Is Gangs of New York (2002) still messy and unfocused, or is it a wildly ambitious big swing that deserves a reappraisal? Is The Departed (2006) still the wrong Scorsese picture to sweep the Oscars, or does it transcend its genre trappings to stand alongside the director’s undeniable gangster masterpiece, Goodfellas (1990)? What about Silence (2016), which has its admirers but never made a big splash? Or The Irishman (2019), a mournful elegy that, to this critic, is among Scorsese’s five best, but to most casual moviegoers, is simply too long, with de-aging effects that distract? And finally, there’s the most divisive of them all, The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), a three-hour examination of American greed that was a big hit at the box office, but uncomfortably for the wrong reasons (people no doubt wanted to see its star, Leonardo DiCaprio, let loose), while several serious-minded critics dismissed it as a portrait of excess without a point.
Scorsese, of course, had a point, his detractors just couldn’t see it. In a post-Trump America, it’s clear that The Wolf of Wall Street is only more prescient as Scorsese explores how far people will go for money and power. Based on Jordan Belfort’s memoir (Terence Winter wrote the screenplay), the movie stars DiCaprio as the infamous stockbroker who made millions by defrauding investors. Despite being a period piece (the story spans from the late 1980s to the early 2010s), it’s a chronicle of who we are right now that says more about American society than any other movie of the 21st century. It’s about how money still talks, how the system that gets people rich is rife with corruption, and how the ones who control it are rewarded with more of what they already have. More cash, more property, more access, and more beautiful women.
The Wolf of Wall Street doesn’t offer a reassuring moral lesson, which I suspect is why some were appalled by it. They craved justice and didn’t get it. By the end, we learn that Jordan’s crimes eventually caught up with him, but after cooperating with the FBI, he received a reduced sentence of 36 months at a minimum-security prison, complete with tennis courts, and was released after serving just 22 months. In the final thought-provoking scene, a pitch-perfect coda that underscores why Scorsese chose to make the movie, a recently released Jordan is speaking at a sales seminar, positioned as an expert who can teach aspiring entrepreneurs how to succeed. “Sell me this pen,” Jordan says to an eager attendee in the front row. As the attendee struggles to make his pitch, Jordan moves on to another one, and then another one. Then, the camera tilts up to the rest of the audience observing with rapt attention, a crowd of riveted people from all backgrounds desperate for the lesson. The final shot, one of the best of Scorsese’s career, tells us everything that’s wrong with the world. Jordan made millions by engaging in illegal schemes, but none of that matters to the audience of the seminar. The fact that he made millions at all is enough to earn him respect in their eyes. That they are a microcosm of the public at large, and that they mirror us, the audience watching the movie, isn’t lost on Scorsese. We are all complicit, he says. And cowardly.
The ending of The Wolf of Wall Street is a clever callback to Goodfellas. After participating in organized crime, Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) is arrested by the FBI and pressured to become an informant. The final scene shows him in the Witness Protection Program, and his narration details his frustrations. He isn’t remorseful for his crimes. Rather, he misses the perks of the criminal lifestyle. He says, “Today, everything is different; there’s no action. I have to wait around like everyone else. Can’t even get decent food. Right after I got here, I ordered some spaghetti with marinara sauce, and I got egg noodles and ketchup. I’m an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook.”
In Henry’s eyes, the downfall is severe, but to the rest of us, it’s a slap on the wrist. The same applies to Jordan. How terrible, they have to live like the average person!
In both Goodfellas and The Wolf of Wall Street, Scorsese condemns the men. It’s impossible to watch the movies’ most harrowing scenes of domestic abuse and not see that. However, he also condemns the American system that doesn’t fairly punish their criminality. The issue isn’t that Henry and Jordan don’t regret their actions. Why should they, Scorsese asks, when there aren’t any significant consequences? If the worst-case scenario is that they end up where everyone else already was — as an average Joe forced to get a job and pay the bills —who wouldn’t cut corners to pursue the high life?
During its initial release, a major criticism of The Wolf of Wall Street was that Scorsese doesn’t devote any screen time to Jordan’s victims. It’s an earnest perspective that posits that spending too much time in the company of Jordan and his friends as they party glamorizes them. Does Scorsese risk making Jordan’s lifestyle appealing? Shouldn’t we see the suffering he causes and walk away from the movie not wanting to follow in his footsteps?
The concerns are sincere, but ultimately, they are rooted in a naive misunderstanding of the world. Jordan’s lifestyle is appealing and that’s part of the problem. Wall Street crooks take private jets while honest Americans must take public transportation, an inequality that Scorsese aims to expose. In the movie, he juxtaposes Jordan’s lifestyle with FBI Agent Patrick Denham’s (Kyle Chandler), the law enforcement official on his case. In one of the standout scenes, Denham and Jordan first meet on Jordan’s yacht, and Jordan rubs Denham’s face in all the luxury that Denham lacks as a government employee. Jordan even tries to tempt Denham with subtle bribes, but Denham sternly refuses. It’s clear that Denham chooses a law-abiding path, but at what cost? By the end, he is seen riding the subway home from work, and the exhausted expression on his face as he observes the other commuters is haunting. Is this the reward for doing the right thing in America? Even after Jordan is released from prison, his lifestyle will likely still be more extravagant than Denham’s, earning more from a single public appearance than Denham makes in a year. The system isn’t fair, but it’s real. Why should Scorsese sugarcoat it?
As for the people Jordan hurt, Scorsese suggests that they — we — bear responsibility for being duped. This is what happens when we participate in get-rich-quick schemes, when we trust strangers with our hard-earned salary, and when we invest in stocks because it’s easier than working and building savings over time. The movie is Scorsese’s brutal thesis statement on American greed. If you throw yourself into the wolf’s den, don’t be surprised if you get swallowed up.
Jordan isn’t Donald Trump, but the people who buy his books and attend his seminars are the same ones who put the Make America Great Again sign on their lawns and say they will still vote for Trump in 2024, despite a record of bogus claims about his business and four criminal indictments. Ten years later, the ascension of Trump makes The Wolf of Wall Street even more relevant. When it came out, it was marketed as a comedy, and indeed, several sequences are hilarious (the quaaludes bit is already iconic), but as the Jordans of the world continue to reign, Scorsese’s cynical howl of despair hits too close to home to elicit chuckles. We’ve been angry too many times now, and have seen Wall Street steal only to watch them stay in power without the system fundamentally changing. Jordan hasn’t gone anywhere, and working people all across the country are still stuck on crowded, sweaty public transportation, wondering when they will make it to the private jet. They won’t, Scorsese says, unless they learn how to con their way on, pushing down their fellow man in the process. There is no shortage of teachings on this. Last year, on November 1, Jordan visited Barnes & Noble in Manhattan to sign copies of his new book, The Wolf of Investing: My Insider’s Playbook for Making a Fortune on Wall Street. I bet it was mobbed.
This post originally appeared on Medium and is edited and republished with author's permission. Read more of William Spivey's work on Medium.
Comments
Leave a comment