I have never been so disgusted by a performance.Deniro, the things he said here...his view on America's democracy is sickening and frightening.He says he is still fighting for Meryl Streep to get her equal share. Go away snowflakes. 1/10

Oscar winning director Barry Levinson had big success by teaming up with HBO on You Don't Know Jack.This time Levinson and HBO have teamed up with Robert De Niro on the true life tale of Bernie Madoff whose fake investment vehicle was exposed during the 2008 financial crisis. Madoff operated a Ponzi/Pyramid scheme where you robbed Peter to pay Paul.When you have movies such as The Big Short and Margin Call that have done a brutal expose of the financial crisis, The Wizard of Lies just felt redundant with an almost movie of the week sheen about it.The film had a confusing narrative and an uneven script. It wants to explain the investigation on Madoff, what his sons knew about the firm's precarious position as well as explain Madoff's investment fraud to the audience.It was best when it was at its simplest. Bernie Madoff telling someone he was a simple man from a humble family then throwing a lavish party where he wanted fresh lobsters caught that morning, not freshly frozen and clean plates. Madoff and his family lived an extravagant lifestyle, it was all based on other people's money. Madoff targeted wealthy Jews like him and royally ripped them off. Once he was exposed many of his victims found out that they were penniless.I found the film dragged and was rather boring. Despite a sterling performance from De Niro and being based on true, tragic events, it was just not interesting enough.

A chronicle of Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme, which defrauded his clients of billions of dollars. The Wizard of Lies packs a dark but also captivating performance by Robert De Niro who shines as Bernie Madoff also it's more than welcome seeing the great Michelle Pfeiffer acting again since 2013's The Family who starred again next to De Niro. The film is based on true events about something that i didn't know honestly and it's good seeing it been translated it on the small screen with a talented cast and wonderful performances from the entire cast. Personally i found the allegations against Madoff quite extreme? I mean common 150 years in prison? which is 1800 weeks? When at the same time are rapists, murderers and psychopaths that are 50 times worse than Madoff but i guess that's how the system works. What Madoff did was bad and wrong but thanks to the great performances by De Niro and Pfeiffer i actually felt a bit bad about their family and the tragedy that happened to their sons. As for flaws with the film? i think it was definitely the run time since there are scenes that weren't that interesting or even important that were needed to be explored but overall The Wizard of Lies is a nice comeback from De Niro after some really terrible movie choices and a welcome return for Pfeiffer as well. (8/10)

Finally De Niro takes a break from hack comedies and mailed in roles for direct to red box garbage films! He delivers his best performance since "Jackie Browne" here as real life super villain Bernie Madoff. The movie itself is a long winded and sometimes trudging look at Madoff's life beginning when he comes clean as essentially a scam artist. De Niro transforms into the ultra rich and short tempered Bernie masterfully. I'm happy to see this after years of writing him off as a guy who'd lost his touch and just does it for the money. This is especially important to see with his upcoming reunion with Pesci and Scorsese in "The Irishman" looming.As a film I'd say this work gets the job done and serves its purpose well. Veteran workman director Barry Levinson who's three plus decade catalog includes all sorts of movies has made a pretty good movie here, possibly one of his best ever? It does not really wow you in anyway but it's also by no means bad. I especially enjoyed the scene in which Bernie attempts suicide with his wife and ends up hallucinating. The Wizard of Lies gets a 7 out of 10 which on my scale makes it a "good" movie, but it surely falls short of greatness with it's mostly straight forward and often dragging delivery.