Actor Ethan Hawke had a strong reaction to the Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio flick Wolf of Wall Street. So much so that he considered the film dangerous, but in a surprising way.
How Leonardo DiCaprio responded to ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ criticism
Wolf of Wall Street received mostly favorable reviews from critics for its story and its performances. It was even nominated for Best Picture at the 2014 Oscars, but lost the contest to 12 Years a Slave. But despite its praise, many criticized the film for its potential messages.
Some believed that Wolf was glorifying the misogynistic and degenerate lifestyles the film’s characters were indulging in. But DiCaprio shared that couldn’t have been further from the movie’s intentions.
“It is an indictment of this world,” DiCaprio once explained to The Hollywood Reporter. “We don’t like these people, you know what I mean? But we very consciously said, ‘Let’s insulate the audience in the mindset of what these people’s lives were like so we better understand something about the very culture that we live in.’ We very purposely didn’t do the traditional approach of cutting away to the people affected by this.”
DiCaprio further shared that Scorsese also denounced the behavior of the movie’s characters. But the filmmaker was interested in exploring their destruction.
“So to be able to do a film like that, with a director like Marty, knowing that he didn’t want to pass judgment on these people because he doesn’t like this world. He doesn’t like these people, but he’s fascinated by this world. He’s fascinated about what it is in human nature that makes us this destructive to others and ourselves,” he added.
Ethan Hawke was haunted by ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ for a year after seeing it
Training Day star Hawke is as much of a cinephile as he is an actor. So when he saw The Wolf of Wall Street, the film couldn’t help slightly concern Hawke, even though he enjoyed the content.
“The Wolf of Wall Street is a dangerous, incendiary work of art. You leave the theater thinking, ‘Wait a second… I was just force-fed misogyny and awful behavior for three hours, but I’m very unsure of things,’” Hawke said in a 2014 interview with Daily Beast.
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There was a worry that audiences might have misinterpreted the film’s intentions, a sentiment that Hawke agreed with.
“’This is really playing with my head,’” Hawke remembered thinking about the film. “That movie’s haunted me for a year.”
Still, the actor sung the movie’s praises. And hinted that Wolf should’ve gotten the kind of attention that another Scorsese-like movie experienced.
“A lot of people made a big deal over American Hustle, and that is a very good imitation Scorsese movie, but we had an actual Scorsese movie that came out that same year,” Hawke added.
Martin Scorsese shared that ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ was supposed to touch a nerve
Scorsese also had his own thoughts on the controversy Wolf of Wall Street potentially stirred. The director already experienced causing a certain amount of uproar with films like Taxi Driver. So some of the backlash against Wolf wasn’t only expected, but welcomed by Scorsese himself.
“It should touch a nerve,” Scorsese said in an interview with IndieWire. “What would be the point of making a film that exposes corruption in the financial world, in a conventional way? It’s already been done! That only makes us feel, as we watch the movie, anybody with any sense, it makes us feel better. It falls into a false system that’s put in place.”
For Scorsese, conveying the film’s message through a safer narrative would’ve sacrificed the movie’s impact.
“In other words, it anesthetizes, makes us feel like we’re watching news on TV. It doesn’t mean anything, it’s not even entertainment. I’m talking about people with good hearts who are making some well-made pictures that make everybody agree with each other and nothing changes. Nothing is going to change with this either,” he said.
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