Wolf of Wall Street Cinematography

The wolf of Wall Street movie is a controversial motion picture based on a bestselling novel about the rise of a Wall Street trader Jordan Belfort. Leonardo Di Caprio, who delves into the life of drugs, women, money laundering and securities fraud plays the main character. Together with his friends, they are able to build a multi-million company that defrauds people by selling them penny stocks.

Wolf of Wall Street movie may be classified as a narrative type of movie and is directed by Martin Scorsese. The cinematographer shot the interesting movie in film mode. Scorsese chose this approach as he saw the images shot by his cinematographer having richer skin tones and possessing more color nuance as compared to digital shots during preproduction testing runs. Most parts of the movie were therefore shot on film, and for night scenes, Alexa was used as well as green screen visual effects.

A major challenge on the film’s director was on deciding how to depict the various phases of the main character’s (Belfort) life. In conjunction with the films cinematographer, Scorsese decided to differentiate scenes of Jordan’s life where he seemed lost or uncertain from the scenes he would appear to have found clarity in his life and some sense of right course. This was successfully achieve from the use of diverse optics, color schemes, and lighting styles. Being guided by Belfort’s mental state and thoughts, the cinematographer alternated between various lenses for example v-lite, Hawk V, V-plus lenses, among others to get various degrees of depth, clarity, and perspective (Barsam & Dave p.238). Moreover, to enhance the contrast, in the different mental states, the director mixed in several diffusion filters, with ambient smoke being used sometimes and pushing the negative. As Rodrigo Prieto, the movies cinematographer explains, at the start of the film, it has a softer and slightly murky look, as Jordan has not yet

found himself. He seems confused and somehow awestruck by the busy Wall Street. During this phase of Belfort’s career, the director used a more narrow depth of field together with some slight alteration of anamorphic lenses (Barsam & Dave p. 240).

Jordan at first works at the firm LF Rothschild before starting his own business. The set at the investment firm is dominated by a color scheme of green and gold light that imply an old vintage look. The director claimed a photo he had seen of a brokerage firm in the 1980’s inspired this idea. In making wide shots, the cinematographer captured the office space using short range V-lite lenses that were able to curve the frames ends a bit, creating a sense of uncertainty. The picture of LF Rothschild is not as crisp clear as the outlook of Jordan’s subsequent firm, which had more of the color white. This helps show a different ambience and timeline of the two firms.

After the crash of 1987, LF Rothschild falls and is shut down. Belfort loses his job and desperately searches for anywhere he can find employment. Eventually, he starts to work as a regular employee at an investment center, an occupation he dislikes. This set was only lit through big windows from one side bringing out a feeling of sort of being in a cave. This part of his life the idea was to show the decline of Belfort’s life and he falls into darkness. After some time Jordan establishes his own brokerage firm and gains massive success. When he knows how to make a lot of money, and is successful, the film has a crisper, pristine look. The cinematographer changed to spherical Master Primes and did not use diffusion for this part.

When he is under investigation, the director, and cinematographer create a sort of paranoia look. They changed back to Hawk anamorphic, with lengthier focal lengths to depict a feeling of being investigated. In some scenes, they also added some smoke to make the background faintly milky and have a shallow depth of field. The cinematographer did also push the film stock for the scenes and stop to improve grain and contrast.

Prieto used an approach aimed at visually differentiating the three reiterations of Belfort’s firm as it grew. It started out in a renovated auto shop then relocated to a suitable office, and later finally moved into a bigger, elaborate office space. To differentiate the sets Rodrigo used a variety of color temperature combinations, applying different filters and diffusion. In the initial location, the auto shop is dimmer and realistic than the later evolved offices. Subsequently, the film brings out a look of power from Belfort and his offices become more luxurious. This is depicted in a crisper look with widely focused shots, white light, clear distinction, and fast camera shifts.

The final version of Jordan’s investment firm is a huge office space full of big windows and offices with glass walls. The location selected for this section was a third floor office building at Westchester in New York. Moreover, the height of the building made it hard to control the amount of sunlight on set and recreating it after sunset. In the evenings to maintain a look of daylight, the film crew had to improvise with light boxes in all sides of the set and vertical blinds to show an effect of a plain whiteout. On another side, Jordan’s lavish office was situated where there lay a window with a vast outward view. The crew also improvised with lamps lighting the backing, and others lighting the set to ensure the film would maintain daylight brightness regardless of the type of weather.

Moreover, the director of the film also created certain images to display characters mental states and emotions. For example, during the many drug escapades of Belfort there were up close shots with the fraudster, as he delivered slow slurred words in his dialogue and feel dizzy or high. The images would bring to mind a feeling of blur but at the same time flowed delivering a sensation of being loose. In one of the scenes where Jordan was high on Quaaludes in a nightclub,

the cinematographer used 20mm lens and brought out very close shots of Leonardo’s mouth and eye as he tried to talk.

The movie may be categorized as a narrative type of movie. There are narrations or commentaries given by the main character, which shape our itinerary in the movie. They are a sequence of cues that guide the viewers in the progression of the movie (Barsam p.159). At the initial scene of the movie, we see busy stockbrokers leapt over their desks in a vast work place where there is a lion lurking the pathways. We are also shown a contrasting view at another angle of the office where there are exhilarated staff who are having fun about to throw a little man towards a Velcro bull's eye. The small man is thrown and a freeze frame appears stopping the man in mid-air. One of the men who have thrown the man approaches the camera and introduces himself as Jordan Belfort. He continues to explain to us with motion pictures and scenes how he lives motivated by drugs, sex, living large and the debauchery he engages in. the scenes are brief and vulgar and does not show the escapade of Belfort implicitly but directly and swiftly.

This type of movie is able to limit our knowledge of certain events and is successful in manipulating the films emotional level arbitrarily. At one time, Belfort angrily slaps Naomi, his Wife. However, the event is shown to the audience through a far camera shot where only a glimpse is seen of what really transpires. The act is seen through a doorway where the impact of the aggression by Belfort is minimized. Here we gain significant information in the story but not as openly as the nearby sexual exploits and drug abuse escapades we get from other sections. This may be explained that a near shot of the violence would have altered the audience’s perception of Jordan’s bad boy pranks as merely entertainment. It would have led viewers to acquire a negative attitude towards the main character.

The director also utilizes suspense in the film to capture the attention of the audience. This is the intensified sense of impatience or anxiousness of what might happen next. For instance, in one scene, Jordan is too high on their special drugs they call Quaaludes to help his colleague Donnie from chocking. This scene makes us anticipate what might happen next due to the tense situation.

The film characters performances especially Dicaprio’s confidence contribute significantly to the mood of the movie. The movie has a stylistically textured soundtrack that is beneficial to the movies nature. The music and sound effects together with Jordan’s Commentary bring out a stimulating and lively experience. The movie is also successful in demonstrating surprising and fascinating attributes of Jordan and his degenerate lifestyle.

Scorsese was also careful in the shot angles he chose for various scenes in the motion picture. When Dunham, the FBI Agent, is interviewing Jordan, the long edgy scene at one instance may lead viewers to consider that the Agent may accept to be paid off by the degenerate Jordan. He makes facial expressions and asks questions implying he may be interested in Belfort’s offer. This conversation is filmed in constricted angles only showing certain parts of the setting. However, when the agent tells Jordan to repeat his proposal we see a shot where the FBI’s colleague in the off screen draws in closer to listen in. This approach helps hide some information and surprise the audience with a different result than they expected.

The film does contain clear depictions of the characters emotions and mental states. There is the use of vivid pictures of the themes contained in the movie. The colors have been expertly selected and used to bring out the season timing and mood as intended by the director.

Works cited

Barsam, Richard M, and Dave Monahan. Looking at Movies: An Introduction to Film. New York:

W.W. Norton & Company, 2013. Print.

The Way Hollywood Tells It: Story and Style in Modern Movies. Bordwell, David. 2006.

/books/wayhollywoodtellsit_intro.pdf

Wolf of Wall Street Cinematography

FS 101: Introduction To Film – Friday 9:00-1:05