With perennial collaborators Martin Scorsese and Leonardo Dicaprio entering the ‘I’ve got loads of money and respect, I can do whatever I like’ stage of their careers, a film like The Wolf of Wall Street, which is sarcastic, sardonic, acerbic and big-headed, was always round the corner. It could, however, have been a total disaster.

Leonardo DiCaprio Wolf of Wall StreetLeonardo DiCaprio as Jordan Belfort

When a film about big-money go-getters is made by a set of big-money go-getters – albeit in different professions from their subject matter – accusations of arrogance over substance can be bandied around. Thankfully, Scorsese and Leo’s latest jaunt has lead to one of their finest outings yet.

And in his bid to make Jordan Belfort the biggest character of 2013, Leo didn’t cut any corners, despite some suggesting he didn’t partake in the raunchier scenes, of which there are many, electing to utilise a body double. That, according to the star, simply isn’t true.

“It was all me, pal . . . all the flopping around, everything, it was all me!” He went on, telling Extra, “Look, when you do a character like this, you have to go all-out, we can’t pull any punches and you have to just swing for the fences, so hopefully people enjoy it.”

If the critics are anything to go by – and they usually are – The Wolf of Wall Street is a rip-roaring, chucklesome (made that word up) affair, with star turns from Leo and Jonah Hill as the visceral Wall Street predators that lose themselves in the mountains of money brought about by their own questionable means. It’s

“A big, unruly bacchanal of a movie that huffs and puffs and nearly blows its own house down, but holds together by sheer virtue of its furious filmmaking energy and a Leonardo DiCaprio star turn so electric it could wake the dead,” says Scott Foundas of Variety.

“Here is a white-collar crime caper that stirs golden memories of the Scorsese back catalogue, often quite knowingly and sometimes to a fault,” writes The Guardian’s Xan Brooks, while Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter states: “Here is a white-collar crime caper that stirs golden memories of the Scorsese back catalogue, often quite knowingly and sometimes to a fault.”

This all culminated in a running score of 89% on Rotten Tomatoes, but that’s only from 19 reviews, meaning that percentage could rise or fall in the coming days. Considering the initial response, though, we’d expect Wolf to settle up somewhere near the 92% mark.

Watch the Wolf of Wall Street trailer here