Martin Scorsese calls ‘Wolf of Wall Street’ controversy “beyond boring”
Written by ABC Audio. All rights reserved. on October 20, 2023
In talking about the real-life genocide behind his new film Killers of the Flower Moon, legendary director Martin Scorsese explained to Timothée Chalamet his take on movie morality.
The filmmaker sat down with the Dune franchise star for GQ and says he found it silly that some critics claim he doesn’t take a stand against amoral characters in classics like Goodfellas or Leonardo DiCaprio‘s character in 2013’s The Wolf of Wall Street.
The based-on-real-life story centers on DiCaprio’s Jordan Belfort, a Wall Street executive whose life of white collar crime afforded him a spiraling sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle.
“I only learned the other day from an interviewer who said, ‘You’re not aware of the war [over] Wolf of Wall Street?’ … Apparently, I was told this, there were two camps: One camp [of critics] that loved the picture and the other camp that was furious, saying I didn’t take a moral stand on Jordan Belfort.”
Scorsese continues, “And one of the critics from the other group that liked the picture said, ‘Do you really need Martin Scorsese to tell you that that‘s wrong?'”
Chalamet asked him, “Does that moralistic attitude bore you a bit now?” to which Scorsese scoffed,
“It’s beyond boring, I think.”
Killers of the Flower Moon, which stars DiCaprio, as well as Robert De Niro, Lily Gladstone and John Lithgow, is now in theaters.
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