Geek of Oz

For his latest film, The Wolf of Wall Street, Martin Scorsese adheres to the old adage: ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’. The diminutive maestro has been cranking out epic crime films for the past forty years. The Wolf of Wall Street is draped in debauchery and proudly indulges in oodles of sex, drugs and naughtiness whilst still acting as a searing indictment of what damage Wall Street traders were able to do throughout the late 80s and into the 90s. This is the kind of film which will either make you hate corporate corruption or go out and buy some shares. Based upon Jordan Belfort’s autobiography of the same name, the film tracks his rise to prominence off the back of some ingenious yet shady loopholes within the stock market. On the way up the corporate food chain, Belfort brings along his closest friends Donnie (Jonah Hill), Brad (Jon Bernthal), Chester (Kenneth Choi) and Nicky (P. J Byrne), all good New Jersey boys who blindly follow the charismatic Belfort through thick...

Whilst looking back over the films of 2011 nostalgia was the theme that was constantly focused upon. This ranged from directors being accused of attempting to recreate the films of the their youth as was the case with JJ Abrams’s Super 8 to Terrence Malick who brought us into a deeply personal recreation of his troubled childhood in the years’ best film The Tree Of Life. The best film relating to nostalgia was Woody Allen’s fantastically magical Midnight in Paris which explored the perils of looking back in time in the hope of keeping memories alive or longing for another time. Hugo the latest film by master film maker Martin Scorsese is the adaption of the novel “ The Invention of Hugo Cabret ” by Brian Selznick which tells the story of a young orphan, Hugo Cabret ( Asa Butterfield ) who lives in the walls of a train station in 1930’s Paris. Hugo is responsible for making sure the clocks of the train station are kept in working order. From the crevices of the train station...