If any movie lover were asked to pick their favorite movie by director Martin Scorsese, the answers would be all over the place.
Scorsese has made a lot of great films over the years, but one of Watch With Us‘ favorites is The Wolf of Wall Street, the 2013 biopic about former stockbroker Jordan Belfort.
Leonardo DiCaprio was cast to play Belfort, continuing the actor’s decades-long collaboration with Scorsese.
If you’ve never seen the film before, we’re sharing the three reasons why you should watch The Wolf of Wall Street on Paramount+.
Leonardo DiCaprio Gave One of His Best Performances
Despite being nominated for Best Actor at the Oscars five times to date, DiCaprio has only won for his role in The Revenant. For our money, DiCaprio was never better than he was in The Wolf of Wall Street when he played a white-collar criminal, Jordan Belfort. While he was nominated for his role, DiCaprio didn’t win, and it’s one of the biggest snubs of the last 15 years.
Perhaps the most impressive part of DiCaprio’s performance is that the audience never hates Belfort as much as they should. As portrayed in the film, Belfort is a terrible person who defines himself by avarice. Greed is his religion, and he doesn’t really love anyone other than himself. That’s not the kind of guy that movie audiences tend to get behind, but DiCaprio is so charismatic in the role that he could have almost gotten away with any of the crimes that were presented in the film.
Margot Robbie Had a Star-Making Turn
Margot Robbie didn’t come out of nowhere, and she’s been working regularly since 2008. But it was Robbie’s role as Naomi Lapaglia — a character based on Belfort’s second wife, Nadine Caridi — that made her into a genuine movie star. And it’s not hard to see why. Robbie is mesmerizing and dynamic in the movie, and it’s almost impossible to take your eyes off her.
The real test of Robbie’s talent was pairing her up with DiCaprio, an actor who had a lot more experience in big movies than she did at the time. Not only did Robbie match DiCaprio’s energy and intensity, she did it in a way that won over the audience. Looking back, casting Robbie in this role was very fortuitous, and she makes the movie better simply by being in it.
It’s a New American Crime Story
It seems like Martin Scorsese doesn’t get out of bed anymore for anything less than a great crime story. Almost all of Scorsese’s films from the last three decades have revolved around crime in some way, from the classics like Goodfellas and Casino to his most recent movie, Killers of the Flower Moon. The Wolf of Wall Street is also a crime story, just not in the same way.
Belfort never needed guns to fleece the foolish out of their money. His words and charisma were more persuasive than any weapon could be. Most of Belfort’s victims willingly gave him money in the name of their own greed. Once Belfort is flush with cash, he indulges every vice he has, including alcohol and drugs.
The real irony about Belfort’s fate is that he took far more money than any ordinary robber, and he essentially escaped many of the legal consequences for his actions. He even reemerged with a new way to profit from his ability to convince people to buy almost anything. If that’s not the American dream in 2025, then we don’t know what is.
The Wolf of Wall Street is streaming on Paramount+.
