I reviewed this piece of amazement back in January but now, tomorrow WED 28th MAY, ROADSHOW ENTERTAINMENT is releasing it for you to rent or buy on DVD, BLU RAY and DIGITAL. 

Leonardo DiCaprio (D to his friends) has and always will be my favourite actor, ever since I saw him in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape I have been mesmerised with his performances, my two favourite films of all time, Titanic and Baz’s Romeo and Juliet, star him and I am the first to queue up when his films release. Some of the Salty Kernels even refer to him as my husband due to my Leo worship. It is a surprise for me to say it about THE WOLF OF WALL STREET, that he basically stalked Martin Scorcese to make, is by far his greatest performance and invites us all to see Leo next level, he basically Daniel Day Lewised the shit out of this role. And the best part, this is probably the best giveaway we have run – it is LEO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The peeps at ROADSHOW ENTERTAINMENT have given us 5X copies to giveaway on BLU RAY. EPIC PRIZE!!  It is out this THUR 23rd January in Australia, it runs for 180mins and it is rated R18+.

 

 

REVIEW BY JASON KING (JANUARY 2014)

Now I may be shunned for this comment, but I have never really been a huge Scorcese fan, I am not a fan of his gangster films, sure, they are superbly made, but they are just not the film type I am eager to run out and see. His CAPE FEAR remake was the first film of his I truly loved, still do. Besides that I cannot choose a fave but including CAPE FEAR, my all time Scorcese films are BRINGING OUT THE DEAD (an impeccable piece of underrated amazement that is even an amazing film starring Nicholas Cage :)), SHUTTER ISLAND (I just love that book) and HUGO (one of the best films of all time in my humble opinion) and this film THE WOLF OF WALL STREET. I have to be honest, I was never really a fan of Scorcese’s collaboration with Leonardo and found that while the films were decent they were never top notch. To me Leo seemed like a person Scorcese would never touch for a film. He was always more the older actor director. It seemed that Leo was latching and certain that if he kept working with Scorcese he may get that desired Oscar he obviously wants so badly. Does he want it for respect or life goal? If for respect then he need not worry, he is one of the most respected actors on the planet that has dedicated his life to film.

 

 

THE WOLF OF WALL STREET ticks every box for me. The production levels are incredible, it is truly a film made by a master and I never thought it possible but Leonardo just blew my mind for his acting. He truly deserves the Oscar for this film, it is beyond anything that you have seen Leo do before, he embraces, owns and goes beyond the required to achieve this role. He has so much of himself invested as the lead in this film you would nearly think he wrote, directed and starred in the film. I whole heartedly clap and cheer this performance, I always knew he was good, I never expected he could be this good.

Enough praise, the story.

 

 

This is the life story, or more the rise and fall story of Jordan Belfort, one of the best sellers the world has seen. This is the guy who can sell ice to Eskimos. He starts out at a big trading firm and is mentored by Mark Hanna, in an incredibly underrated but sublime performance by Matthew McConaughey, and then gets his licence and on the same day the market has one of the biggest crashes in history and he is out on his ass. Looking for jobs he stumbles across this little business looking for brokers to sell penny shares, these are itsy bitsy valued shares literally worth a few cents each that will basically never go anywhere, but as opposed to the profit of a 5 or 10% from normal stocks penny shares in this firm generate a 50% profit return to the trader. This is more than incentive enough for Belfort to sell the shit out of them. He starts making big money and starts his own firm milking these shares to unwitting folk and then it hits him, why not sell these in huge numbers to the big spenders? And he does and his firm goes bananas and makes more money than can be imagined. Problem is, it is not strictly legal the way they are doing things…….

 

 

I have a couple of issues with the film. It is too long and formulaic, do not get me wrong, I can watch Leonardo marathons for days on end, but we know the film path, we know what is going to happen, the film is about someone who gets onto the good life the naughty way, they love and live up the high life up and up and up and then BOOM, we watch them plummet from heaven. Think BLOW, think THE DOORS, THE SOCIAL NETWORK, THE BASKETBALL DIARIES and so on. I do not have a huge issue with this as yes, it may be formulaic and biopic, but it is so superbly made this can be overlooked, the problem I had was the upwards and immensely insane awesome journey goes on for too long, I know Scorcese likes his epics, and this truly is an epic. At exactly 180mins I thought 20mins less would have been preferable for the majority of the viewers. The next thing is the profanity, if you know me you are probably laughing your head off at that statement, I swear like a trucker most of the time. But at 180mins with the word FUCK said 506 times and breaking the world record for the most amount of F Bombs that works out at saying FUCK 2.81 times per minute – intense – but also will piss my mother off and while I barely noticed it, a lot of people will, was it necessary?

 

 

The film is hardcore, I mean, it is the first R Rated film in Australia in a damned long time. And there are many reasons for this. The sexual debauchery, the drugs, OMG the drugs, I was craving a quaalude about 30mins in. I was also shocked to see Margot Robbie so naked and shaved that I am pretty sure I could see what she had for breakfast, and from the beauty of the woman I can see why straight men get all OMFG at a woman like this, it is like me staring at a naked Zac, Francisco or Channing, she is incredible and the way she is presented has not really been seen in a film that is not a porn :). Regardless of Margot Robbie’s body and presented vagina, her performance is superb and she is the perfect match as Belfort’s wife.

The style of this film is like the book, it is a biography, and it is sometimes narrated to you by Belfort/Leo, talking direct to camera, or more you, the viewer, about what is going on, it is high energy, it is fast and Leo owns what he does. You love him, you want to be him, you want the women, the planes, the parties, the drugs, the sex, the bloody boat, everything. The way Leo plays this role is so cocky, it reminds me of a bunch of boys high on sugar showing off to each other and pretending they are gods, bragging about their dick sizes and gesticulating blow jobs and generally being dicks, but they were, they were showering in money, literally burning and throwing it away. And this is when you start to see the effects of this high life, they really are dickheads, self indulgent greedy assholes taking advantage of people. Belfort, while lost in his drug induced self godlike belief is really a fucking bastard. But drugs will do that, just ay NO kids!

 

 

The film does make it out to be enticing but it also subtly shows you why it is so bad, what happens when you do the wrong thing, and everything that rises must fall, it is physics after all. But while these guys get up to some hideous things the movie does contain what I consider the best drug taking scene of all time. Watching Leo and the most amazing Jonah Hill fight while they are incapable of using their legs is phenomenal, I was crying with laughter – from the second they took those heavenly top shelf quaaludes to the time food comes flying out of Hill’s mouth you will be laughing so hard. I am laughing just thinking about it 🙂

I have spoken enough, if the film was shorter it would be a perfect film for me, only losing half a pop for the length. THE WOLF OF WALL STREET deserved Oscars, especially for the superb performance by Leo, easily his best performance of all time.

 

JK’S POP SCORE:

KERNEL BEN’S POP SCORE: 

KERNEL DARA’S POP SCORE:

KERNEL ADAM’S POP SCORE:

KERNEL JOHN’S POP SCORE:

KERNEL NICK’S POP SCORE:

 

With special thanks to ROADSHOW ENTERTAINMENT to win one of the 5x copies of the BLU RAY of THE WOLF OF WALL STREET you need to either like and share this post on Facebook or retweet/ favourite it on Twitter, you then need to answer the following question.

Firstly, just an FYI on how to increase chances of winning a salty comp; commenting on the review generally holds you in better stead of winning as opposed to just comp sexing 

WHAT IS THE BEST LEO FILM OF ALL TIME AND WHY? Be warned – Leo is my all time favourite actor 🙂 He has a tie from me – R&J and Titanic.

If you do not have Facebook and Twitter then get with the times old timer haha – You can still enter, leave your entry below and email me at jkdigitaldesigns@gmail.com telling me you don’t have social media 

Prizes will be awarded based on skill and selected purely on the thoughts of the judges, said judges being the Salty Kernels.

The prizes will be sent in the next week or two. Good luck! Oh, and minor housekeeping – huge apologies for overseas readers, this competition is only available to Australian residents.