The Wolf of Wall Street

I want to hold off on making any kind of declarative statements about The Wolf of Wall Street until I see it again. It reminded me a bit of when I saw Django Unchained last year (coincidentally another film released on Christmas day that has a great performance from Leonardo DiCaprio): here’s a film from one of my favorite American filmmakers, but something just felt off about it. The pacing felt all wrong at times in Tarantino’s film, but I chalked that up to the fact that it was, sadly, the first time he had to work without his go-to editor Sally Menke (who had tragically died in 2010), whose absence was quite noticeable. Martin Scorsese, however, didn’t have to replace a long-time collaborator and good friend at editor, so he doesn’t have that excuse, for Thelma Schoonmaker did work on The Wolf of Wall Street. Which makes the whole thing so confounding: how in the hell did these two think this version of The Wolf of Wall Street resembled a complete film? Not only does the film resemble something hastily stuck together with scotch tape, it also lacks the headlong energy of the film it is most being compared to, Casino.

I’m not saying it’s bad — because there are many, many times throughout its three hour runtime that I was enthralled (or laughing my ass off, for the film is very funny). But it doesn’t really earn its length. I never felt like Casino was a three hour film, but boy did I begin to feel that final 60 minutes of The Wolf of Wall Street. And I think one of the film’s biggest flaws is that it think excess is a subtle substitute for that kind of headlong energy found in Casino or Bringing Out the Dead. It uses some of the same narrative tricks that Goodfellas implemented (there’s a moment where DiCaprio talks directly to the audience, explaining what was going on in the room where he works, Henry Hill-like) like multiple voice over narrations, but it lacks the urgency in how that story is told. The film is lacking something; there’s no getting around it. Perhaps my concerns would disappear with another viewing. Like I said, I want to see The Wolf of Wall Street again. It almost demands a second viewing because of just how much happening on the screen while you watch it.

But the story of Jordan Belfort (DiCaprio) and his merry band of Hedonists (most notably Donnie Azoff played by Jonah Hill), and all of the debauched yens they succumb to, begins to tread water after about the 150 minute mark. The movie feels so disjointed at the end (I thought it had ended two different times). Oh, here’s Belfort on a boat in a storm; here he is sitting at a table talking to some federal agents; here he is making an infomercial; here he is talking to those same agents again; here is wearing a wire; here he is getting arrested...and so on. All of those moments feel so disconnected; or, better yet, they feel like they’ve been dropped in on the viewer with their larger context removed. Those scenes with Belfort made me shift in my seat (I never checked the time, but I was tempted to) because they kept coming on the heels of what felt like natural endings for the film. It wasn’t as bad as Return of the King, but it made me think of it.

Over and over, the film would gain momentum and then screech to a halt; its rhythms in certain sections felt so uncharacteristically off. Perhaps this is because of the locked-in release date for the film, and so Scorsese and Schoonmaker just threw together what they could (apparently the film had to go from a four hour cut to a three hour cut) and it looks every bit a slapped together effort in parts. The aforementioned scene of Belfort and Azoff riding out a storm on Belfort’s yacht seems so superfluous (my wife turned to me at that point and just asked, “what the hell is this movie?”). And I get it, I mean that’s probably the point of Scorsese’s film: everything about these people’s lives is superfluous. But boy did that scene just come off as flat to me. Again, excessiveness on the screen does not necessarily equate to energy emanating from the screen. So I was just waiting for that scene to come to an end and put me out of my misery.

Similarly, there are some odd cuts at the end. When Belfort wears a wire and is told to incriminate all of his co-workers, there is a moment where he’s eating lunch with Azoff, and he writes a note on a napkin that informs him he’s wearing a wire and that he shouldn’t say anything that can incriminate him. Well, the next scene is Belfort being awoken by the federal agents (led by Kyle Chandler of “Friday Night Lights”) holding the napkin, informing Belfort that he’s going to jail. Okay. How did he get the napkin? Did Azoff rat out Belfort? Was it found with the feds raided the building (probably)? I don’t need a beat by beat explanation of how they got the napkin, but it’s such an odd cut that feels designed to do nothing more than quickly tidy up the movie.

Okay, I’m getting too negative here. Like I said, there is so much to like about The Wolf of Wall Street. Primarily, this is Leo’s movie. He owns every scene and seems to be having a helluva time playing Belfort. Make no mistake, the film depicts these men as the douchebags they are, but that doesn’t automatically disqualify the film as comedy. The Wolf of Wall Street is really funny in parts, and that’s almost all due to the sheer enthusiasm and energy brought to the performance by DiCaprio. It’s the best thing I’ve seen him do, and it may just go down as the one performance he’s most remembered for.

Specifically, I am thinking of two scenes that are  brilliant displays of physical acting. The first is a moment where Belfort, via voiceover, informs of his morning ritual with his wife (the fantastic newcomer Margot Robbie): an hilarious argument where Belfort, perched on his knees (its almost like he’s in a constant position of asking for forgiveness), argues with his wife about the name Venice. She wants to know if he’s been messing around on her because he’s been saying this name in his sleep. While he tries to think of a way to weasel out of the precarious spot he’s in, Scorsese cuts away to one of the film’s more wild (and wildly hilarious) scenes where Belfort has hot wax poured on him by a dominatrix named Venice. The energy that DiCaprio expends in this scene is nothing short of phenomenal, mostly because DiCaprio’s face turning red and his neck veins bulging, it never feels he’s overacting in a bad way. And that’s why it works so damn well. It’s one of the best scenes in the film, particularly in the way that Robbie plays off DiCaprio, milking the gag of her throwing cold water on this wild animal, and him getting more and more pissed each time she does it.

Don’t get me wrong, though, it’s absolutely over-the-top, but it is so in the best possible way — the way in which Scorsese so brilliantly and singularly does excessive. And perhaps the best scene in the film (and certainly the one I’ve heard the msot people talk about) is the scene where Belfort, hopped up on Quaaludes (“I discovered a new phase: the Bell’s cerebral palsy.”), tries to make it home before Azoff, who is also hopped up on Quaaludes and is using Belfort’s recently tapped phone, says something stupid (likely) that could incriminate them both. It’s a showcase scene for Leo, who I really want to see do a physical comedy now after witnessing his contorted efforts to get to his car. The scene is some seriously brilliant physical acting by DiCaprio, and it is a scene that somehow pulls off being hilarious, sad, and pathetic.

I don’t understand the complaints levied against Scorsese and co., saying that he doesn’t condemn these characters enough. Honestly, how can anyone watch the scene where Belfort explains via voice over that Brad (Jon Bernthal from “The Walking Dead”, who is really great in this) commits suicide and then segues to the next scene with a nonchalant, “Anyway,” and think that Scorsese is letting these guys off easy. The final hour of the film felt like nothing but condemnation. In fact, the only character that I was remotely happy to see show up near the end was Bernthal’s Brad because at least his crimes felt petty enough that you didn’t mind laughing at him. There is an argument between him and Azoff near the end of the film that takes place in a parking lot that seemingly goes on forever. I was so tired of Jonah Hill by this point that all I wanted to do was yell at the screen, “Just give him the damn briefcase already!” It’s another example of how some scenes at the end could have been tinkered with, but I also think Scorsese is doing something here that is just as deliberate as the scene with the yacht in the storm: he’s making sure we’re sick of seeing these characters. They are deplorable, and the scene in the parking lot was like finger nails on a chalkboard to me, and I think that’s the way Scorsese and his writer Terence Winter (the two work together on “Boardwalk Empire”) want it to come across.

At the beginning of the film, I was laughing a lot at/with these characters. So kudos to Scorsese and Winter for making sure audiences turn on these people. This isn’t a tragedy because we feel bad for these characters (I love the pseudo-tragic tone and the way Scorsese shoots the scene where Belfort attempts to kidnap his own child — there’s nothing tragic about it; it’s merely pathetic) and what comes of their lives; it’s a tragedy because nothing is learned in this movie. These men and their lifestyles and their twisted ethos is perpetual. By the end, nothing has changed (I love the callback to the “sell me this pen” moment at the end), and Belfort is simply just peddling the same bullshit in a different arena. We’re not supposed to think their antics are cute or funny, but that doesn’t mean we’re not supposed to laugh during the film. And since the film is funny and I did laugh a lot, that doesn’t mean I believe that the filmmakers are making light and condoning Belfort’s escapades.

I’ve seen The Wolf of Wall Street described as a three hour version of the memorable cocaine-induced montage that marks the end for Henry Hill in Goodfellas. I don’t know. There are too many moments during The Wolf of Wall Street that lack that kind of frenetic energy. Besides, I think Scorsese already made that movie — it was called Bringing Out the Dead (Scorsese’s most criminally underrated films). I think the sloppiness of the film’s editing gets in the way of The Wolf of Wall Street being on a par with the exhilarating craziness of Bringing Out the Dead or, as I alluded to above, the headlong energy found in Casino with its great musical cues, patented Scorsese whip pans, or other techniques the old master usually employs. Again, I really feel like the editing here is showing us all the excess in order to mask how un-energetic it comes across. Which, again, may have been Scorsese’s intent.

Rhythm and pacing is such an odd thing to criticize when discussing a Martin Scorsese/Thelma Schoonmaker collaboration. But no matter how tempted I may be to give Scorsese a pass because I know what he may have intended to do based on his previous films, there’s just no getting around the biggest hang-ups I had with The Wolf of Wall Street. And I think this is why I’m so excited to revisit the film. Now that I know Scorsese’s endgame, I’ll be curious to see if the film works on me differently a second time. Perhaps I won’t be so distracted (in a good way) by DiCaprio’s acting that I’ll be able to focus more on what Scorsese was trying to say with his aesthetic choices (I admit, even though I didn’t think music worked the way it usually works in a Scorsese film, I loved his use of the Lemonheads’ version of “Mrs. Robinson”), and maybe not just understand more fully what Scorsese was going for, but to see if I’m wrong in my assessment that The Wolf of Wall Street is a sloppy film filled with some spectacular scenes that never quite coalesce into the kind of finished product we come to expect from the American master.

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Catching up with 2013: The Lords of Salem

The Lords of Salem is something special. The type of outré experience found in the best European horror films — a film that made me giddy with anticipation for each scene. I haven’t felt that way in a long, long time in regards to a horror film, and I could easily see myself slotting The Lords of Salem into my regular Halloween viewing rotation. Rob Zombie’s latest isn’t going to be for every horror fan — it’s far too much of a slow burn for it to appeal to the masses — but it’s so visually and aurally on-point, I cannot fathom how some are calling the film boring. Despite the film’s old chestnut of a narrative (Satanism/witches) suggesting that the whole thing may be old hat, and despite the film being slower than most horror films (there’s a surprising amount attention paid to characters, and Zombie gets some good performances from his leads), The Lords of Salem is never boring. It reminded me of some of my favorite Italian horror films (especially Fulci’s City of the Living Dead) and some of John Carpenter’s early work.

Perhaps those that didn’t care for the movie were merely unengaged in the story of Heidi (Sheri Moon Zombie), a recovering drug addict turned popular late night DJ. Her co-workers, Whitey (Jeff Daniel Phillips) and Herman (Ken Foree) help round out the popular trio known as “The Big H Radio Team.” Like all DJs, they have their bits and their shticks, and one night while doing their show a mysterious wooden box appears for Heidi from an unheard of band calling themselves The Lords of Salem. Once the record is played on the show, all sorts of odd goings-on occur. The music is a huge hit in Salem, and really strikes a nerve with on-air guest Francis Matthias (Bruce Davidson, giving a great performance) who is writing a book about the Salem witch trials. However, Heidi seems to be hearing something completely different than the masses, for every time the needle drops on the LP, she begins hallucinating.

Or so we’re led to believe.It’s never explicitly laid out whether this is all in the mind of a recovering drug addict who has relapsed, or if this is a straight-up horror film. So, I guess I can see why some threw up their hands in frustration with Zombie’s film or shook their head in disbelief over people like me drooling over the film. It’s a tricky, different kind of horror film. And for that, I am grateful.

The film’s intentions are elusive, which adds to the dread that underlines every scene; it may not be obvious and explicit dread, but there’s something unsettling about The Lords of Salem that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, and I love it when a horror film displaces me in that fashion than just trying to scare me with schlocky jump scares and cheap looking gore effects.

I hate when people qualify aspects of filmmaking simply because it is found in a “lesser” genre film, but I’m going to do it here (forgive me): the acting is pretty damn good. Not just for a horror film, but for a Rob Zombie movie, too. Zombie is no different than Tarantino in that he likes to pay homage to the films he grew up with by casting actors from the B-Movies he grew up watching. Here, he casts Foree (Dawn of the Dead), Dee Wallace (The Howling), and Meg Foster (They Live) in various roles to great effect. His wife, Moon Zombie, as the film’s lead plays Heidi to great effect. Her recovering drug addict actually elicits some poignant moment, a rare thing indeed for a horror film.

One thing I have been noticing more and more with Zombie’s films: he’s pretty good at directing actors. But perhaps nothing prepared me for how well he paced the film. There are some moments where Zombie really slows things to down to develop characters, and for that I was grateful; it makes the ambiance and dread resonate all the more.

One of the best things about the film is one of the best things about the horror genre in general: the element of surprise. In The Lords of Salem, lots of weird shit happens, yes, but horror films don’t require a fool-proof narrative in order to be successful — sometimes weird shit happens “just because.” And that’s okay and the best kind of surprise a horror film can deliver depending on the context of your horror film. Lucio Fulci (post-Zombi 2) was only ever interested in the image and the displacement of the viewer via the succession of his images. Zombie seems to be cribbing from the same playbook here. But that’s not a dig; no, Zombie is showing himself to be a better director with each film he releases, and similar to Tarantino, he is more and more interested in making a much broader, varied pastiche, which I think gives his films more energy.

Rather than just making his version of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (House of 1000 Corpses, Devil’s Rejects) or just making his version of the slasher (Halloween and Halloween II, which was much better than his first attempt at being something more than just a remake), here the breadth of Zombie’s influences is greater as he seems to be making his version of The Shining, yes (the hallways of the apartment Heidi lives are like a more drab version of the hallways of  The Overlook Hotel), but also a Ken Russell film (in fact, Zombie stated that The Lords of Salem was conceived with the idea of being as if Ken Russell directed The Shining), and an Argento/Fulci type Italian horror film. And I don’t know about all of you, but out of that bunch, that last type of horror film is the most interesting to me.

Zombie and his cinematographer, Brandon Trost, are indebted to outré nature of Argento’s baroque horror films like Suspiria and Inferno, but even more so they seem to be heavily influenced by Lucio Fulci’s City of the Living Dead (the mummified priests that pop up reminded me of another Fulci creation: Dr. Freudstein from The House by the Cemetery, which got me thinking: if anyone were qualified to remake a popular Fulci film, it would be Zombie). The way Zombie and Trost shoot the Salem exteriors is eerily reminiscent of the way Fulci and his cinematographer, the great Sergio Salvati, evoked dread with those great tracking shots through the doomed city of Dunwich.

So, yeah, visually, the film evokes the great Italian masters like Argento and Fulci, but I also saw a bit of Michele Soavi in there. I can’t be sure that Zombie is a fan of Soavi’s La Setta (The Sect), but there sure were parts of this film, especially the ending, that reminded me of Soavi’s own take on the whole women-as-vessel-for-demon-child subgenre. And about the film’s ending: man, is that quite the setpiece. Some disliked the ending, and even though I agree in that I found the lead-up (very Argento) to the film’s coda more intriguing than the payoff, I still loved what Zombie was doing with that ending. I know that final montage isn’t for everyone, but I loved it — it reminded me of one of those gonzo montages Ken Russell would put in one of his films (more specifically Altered States).

The Lords of Salem has a very Euro Horror rhythm to it, too. Zombie and his editor, Glenn Garland, take a page out of Kubrick’s book by building dread by marking days of the week with title cards, each coming on the heels of a key scene that introduces each day of the week with more dread than the previous (my favorite being when Heidi walks by a grotesque figure in her bathroom...and then it cuts to the title card for the next day). It’s similar to what John Carpenter did in his great Euro Horror-influenced film Prince of Darkness. And it’s a great way to build tension despite very little actually happening on screen.

I think it is in the editing — the pacing — of the film that I was most appreciative of. I’ve already re-visited the film, and it’s one of those horror films that has a way of getting under your skin — its effects sustaining for days after — and it’s why I think it is one of those films that I could see slotting into my regular rotation of must-see movies on Halloween. It got to me in a way that is very similar to City of the Living Dead: the film has flaws to be sure, but there’s just something about it that gets me, and I think the editing and the way Zombie just lets his atmosphere do all of the talking.

Aurally, the film is a masterpiece. Zombie collaborates with his guitarist, John 5, to create a truly unsettling score (especially once the needle drops on The Lords of Salem record that drives Heidi crazy). I love that Zombie understands how to use sound to his advantage, which is so crucial for horror film (this should come as no surprise since he is a musician). The music stings are sometimes so subtle—the opposite of what modern horror tells us is scary—that we barely notice there’s music there; however, like the Heidi’s downward spiral thanks to the bizarre record she plays, I felt a similar displacement every time that musical would hum or thump in the background. It seriously unnerved me, which is exactly what I wanted it to do.

Zombie has claimed that he is done with horror. That’s too bad since The Lords of Salem is just gorgeous to look at. Cliché “Satanism horror film” iconography aside, it's just a pleasure to bask in the imagery on screen. However, it makes me glad that he’s so willing to step outside of the genre he is associated with. I like that he’s willing to go outside of his comfort zone. In fact, The Lords of Salem is so well made and so damn gorgeous to look at and such an affecting experience, that Zombie could be a seriously great director, not just a good genre filmmaker.

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Catching up with 2013: The Way, Way Back

Tonally, Nat Faxon and Jim Rush’s The Way, Way Back reminded me a bit of Greg Motolla’s wonderful coming of age story Adventureland. Even though The Way, Way Back deals with younger characters, here we have a young male protagonist, Duncan (Liam James), using an amusement park to help him navigate the murky waters of his life that await him post-summer vacation. Those murky waters: which parent he’ll end up living with, each residing on opposite coasts. On the west coast is Duncan’s father, who always seems to have something going on and keeps his son perpetually hoping that he’ll be invited to stay with him. On the east coast — where the film takes place — Duncan’s divorced mother, Pam (the always great Toni Collette), is dragging him along to a beach house with her new boyfriend, Trent (Steve Carell). There, all of the usual coming of age/Summer that Defined My Life stuff happens, with all of the usual characters that inhabit these type of indies (Allison Janney as the acid-tongued drunk and Sam Rockwell as freewheeling guru).

That’s not to say The Way, Way Back isn’t effective in parts. Rockwell and James are great together (especially their last two scenes, which trend more towards the dramatic), and Anna Sophia Robb’s performance as Susanna, the girl that (mostly) quietly observes Duncan’s behavior, finding him fascinating in the process. Janney and Carell seem mostly superfluous, though, and even though Janney does elicit laughs and Carell elicits cringes, they’re both just kind of going through the motions.

Superfluous and familiar character types aside, I appreciated Faxon and Rash’s reluctance to use narration or spell out some kind of usual coming of age epiphany via exposition at the end. The Oscar winners do a good job of keeping things humming and refraining from doing any kind radical character makeovers (in fact, I would say I liked this film more than the film they won their Oscar for, The Descendants, because this one is more earnest in that regard). Collette is always brilliant and worth watching, and Sam Rockwell puts a lot of energy into his role, yet he wisely knows when to dial down his shtick as Owen — the immature man-child that shows Duncan how to follow his own path (their introduction to each other, using Pac-Man as an obvious metaphor, is a great scene, but it tips its hand early in regards to what we’re getting with Owen).

But  it feels minor for the subgenre; The Way, Way Back is not as smart about young male life or as funny as something like the aforementioned summertime coming of age tale Adventureland, but it goes down just as smoothly. It’s a totally watchable and smile-inducing experience that is nothing memorable or note-worthy, but it’s perfect for a lazy afternoon/evening.

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Catching up with 2013: All is Lost

J.C. Chandor’s All is Lost is a mesmerizing experience. One of the very best pictures of the year. Much of this, no doubt, is owed to the film’s lead — and only — performance. “Tour de force,” that oft-used cliché when describing an award worthy performance, comes to mind when describing Robert Redford’s performance as Our Man (the fact that he remains nameless and, for the most part, history-less is one of the many things I admired about the movie). And that is an appropriate way to describe Redford since all 105 minutes of the film is all Redford all the time, so the performance better engage the viewer, and it better be something that keeps the viewer always wondering what’s going to happen next. Redford is nothing short of phenomenal here. Redford’s face says it all: the look he gives when he knows he’s in some shit, the devastating look he gives his ship as he watches it sink, and the heartbreaking way he lets go of the tether to his life raft — fully aware that things are about to get even more bleak. There is also moment of realization on that life raft that is so frustrating, so deflating, that Our Man simply cannot hold it in anymore and yells out the most anguished “Fuck!” I’ve heard in quite some time. Is it to God (doubtful since he doesn’t add a “you” to the end of it)? To himself for being so careless? To the life he knows he will not return to? This little moment is just one of many where Redford says so much by doing so little.

Yet, as crucial as the lead performance is to the film’s success, All is Lost would merely be a “good” film and not a great and memorable film were it not for Chandor’s attention to details (there are so many moments where I found myself on the edge of my seat wondering what he was doing and why he was doing it, watching this character think and process and survive) and the film’s tremendous use of sound (in addition to the great storm scenes, there is a moment where Our Man goes back onto his sinking boat to retrieve some items, and the creaking and cracking and deep moans that emanate from the doomed ship are downright terrifying). The ending will no doubt be a point of contention for some (this will be one of those movies that I recommend to people, and they’ll probably wonder what the hell is wrong with me), but like all great works of existentialism, the ending can mean whatever you want it to mean depending on how you view the world — similarly, like all great existential works, it has the ability to make us inventory on our lives and think about the world in which we inhabit a little differently.

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Side Effects

On the off-chance that I actually do get to a movie theater and see a movie, I usually have high expectations for what gets my time and money. I maybe see two or three movies in the theater a year, so when I go, I want I want it to be worth my while. In other words, it takes a special movie made by a special filmmaker to get me out to the theater. I can think of no better dangling carrot to get me out to the theater than Side Effects, for it is being marketed as “Steven Soderbergh’s final film.” On the whole, I felt extremely satisfied by Side Effects and its slippery-slope of a narrative (brilliantly aided by Thomas Newman’s score, which reminded me of something out of one of Argento’s ‘70s films), but when I consider the film as Soderbergh’s last (and I certainly can’t be alone here), I cannot help but feel that even though a an appropriate encapsulation of the man’s career the last 10 years, it’s a tad underwhelming knowing that one of the great modern filmmakers consciously chose this as his swan song.

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