Runtime: 2 hours, 22 minutes
Rating: PG-13
Director: Baz Luhrmann
Quick Impressions:
I don’t understand how anyone can be surprised or disappointed by this movie. Perhaps some people won’t like it, and perhaps they have very good reasons. But if you’ve read The Great Gatsby and seen any Baz Luhrmann film ever, then I don’t know what else you can possibly expect when you buy a ticket to this movie. I’ve been excited about this adaptation for some time, and it met my expectations exactly. What else could it end up being like? Given the source material, the director, and the cast, I’m stumped trying to imagine other possible outcomes. And—as an admitted fan of both Leonardo
DiCaprio and Baz Luhrmann—I loved it.
But I should probably disclose immediately that I’ve never been a fan of the book. Not that I hate it—in fact, I will readily acknowledge that as a particularly American story, Gatsby could be considered the greatest American novel (just not if I’m the one doing the considering). Even though I remember tons of people I respect singing its praises throughout the years—including my younger sister—I never connected to The Great Gatsby and haven’t read it since high school. That I remember so much about the book—the butler’s nose, the green light, all that jazz about boats beating on ceaselessly—says more about the diligence of my junior English teacher than the power of Fitzgerald’s prose. (And I will say that she was unusually dedicated and persistent.)
I don’t care at all about Fitzgerald’s novel, but I’ve never forgotten the butler’s nose and often spend sleepless nights wondering if it’s more metonymy or synecdoche or if anybody really knows the difference, least of all the poor maligned butler who’s probably stumbling drunkenly around East Egg trying to figure out if there’s any deeper meaning to the apparently nonsensical Lear poem “The Pobble Who Has No Toes.” And best of luck to him there!)
What I’m trying to say is, this is a lavish, gorgeous, spectacular and well-acted production of a terribly depressing story about a bunch of jerks who get away with it, and the rest of us hapless idiots doomed never to realize that no matter how hard we try, we are not destined for a life that looks like it was executive produced by Jay Z.
In other words, it’s The Great Gatsby adapted for the screen by Baz Luhrmann.
The Good:
When I first heard that Baz Luhrmann was making The Great Gatsby, I thought, That’s the least crazy sentence I’ve ever heard that has “Baz Luhrmann” in it. Luhrmann is definitely one of those directors who is not for everyone, but you can’t say he doesn’t have a signature style. I’m always pleased when people can get away with deliberate eccentricity. Nothing thrills me more than crazy weirdoes being allowed to do whatever they want because I always think, Well, that should be working out for somebody, right? If Baz Luhrmann can do it, one day I can do it, too, right?
Right???? (I’ll keep trying. Ceaselessly.)
Anyway, I’ve liked all of his movies, even Australia. (Yes, it’s far from perfect, but you can’t say it isn’t entertaining.) I actually prefer his adaptation of Romeo + Juliet to many others, even though I think it would be better if he left a bigger pile of corpses at the end. (Isn’t more corpses always better in a tragedy? Shakespeare certainly thought so.)
Gatsby + Luhrmann seemed like a perfect fit from the start, and I think the results bear that out.
As far as I’m concerned, the sets, costuming, and music all worked very well. In fact, if I were a high school student being forced to read The Great Gatsby, I would be delighted to be able to watch this movie afterwards. (Just make sure you do watch it afterwards, not instead of, if you want an A on any tests or quizzes. You could probably fake your way through an essay with just the movie, though.)
Some might argue that the visual symbolism is not very subtle in this production, but if you think it’s subtle in the book, then you must be the type of person who delivers long, eloquent monologues while staring wistfully at objects that remind you of people. And I’ll bet you gossip in synecdoche, too! I loved the way the movie bombards us with key symbols and quotations from the novel. It’s like I get to experience the Gatsby portion of my eleventh grade English class all over again—and this time I get popcorn!
But even though Luhrmann presents Gatsby with all the spectacle and high production value you’d expect from him, he does not overlook the human element of the story.
Australia wasn’t exactly a smashing success (though I liked it), so I’m really kind of amazed by the outstanding cast that Luhrmann managed to assemble for this project. Though I’m biased in Leonardo DiCaprio’s favor because I was so touched by his work in The Departed and have enjoyed everything he’s done since, I think even objectively, his performance as Gatsby is the best in the film. And it should be because the film is built around it, clearly dependent on that star turn that it’s working hard to showcase.
Honestly, I liked the 2000 made-for-TV Gatsby reasonably well, too, but Paul Rudd as Nick Carraway really upstaged and overwhelmed Gatsby in that production. I think Baz Luhrmann has the right idea. Gatsby—especially in a film adaptation—ought to be the most prominent and arresting character,
played by the biggest star. After all, Nick’s the one we depend on for narration, and he’s completely obsessed with Gatsby and his love for Daisy to the point that he’s not really engaged in his own relationship with Jordan Baker. (In fact, in this version, that relationship doesn’t even seem to be happening.) What most fascinates the narrator of the book is what the film should focus on, too. The narrator is less important than the story he’s discovered.
Still, Tobey Maguire is very good, too, as Nick Carraway. (To be honest, I liked Paul Rudd better, which is odd because I’m not a big fan of Paul Rudd. But that Nick wouldn’t work with this Gatsby.) Though as I’ll explain later, I do think Carraway’s character is misused a bit—which adversely affects Maguire’s performance—Maguire has fantastic chemistry with DiCaprio. The two play off each other very well, making the relationship and Gatsby in particular, feel surprisingly real and nuanced.
Another standout in the cast is Jason Clarke who blew me away once before this year in Zero Dark Thirty. George Wilson is far from a coveted role, but Clarke so shines in it that I cared about Wilson in a way I never had before. His performance is very powerful and much more natural than some of the others.
Sometimes it seems like DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, and Jason Clarke are in one movie, while some other members of the cast are in another production putting on a stage play at Disneyland.
I guess the person I’m really thinking of here is Joel Edgerton. He’s a great actor, but his characterization of Tom Buchanan is so hammy and affected that in his early scenes, I couldn’t get past his odd voice and clearly fake American accent. But then the strangest thing happened. After a while, I got used to his crazy voice, and the performance really started to grow on me. Watching this film, I also found a new appreciation for Tom Buchanan.
And I can say this for him, he isn’t phony. Tom is who he is. Of course, who he is is an impulsive, snobby, bigoted, privileged, philandering, woman-beating, white-supremicist polo player (who prefers not to be called a polo player at parties), but to his credit, he isn’t trying to hide any of this. On the contrary, he’s quite proud of himself. As far as I’m concerned, the Tom in this movie was a far more interesting and—even at moments sympathetic—character than the very dull and two-dimensional Tom in the book. I credit Edgerton’s performance entirely, particularly for those rare sympathetic moments because on paper (and in fact) Tom is really just a reprehensibly horrible person. So the fact that I was
able to sympathize with him at all is a testament to Edgerton’s talent. From my point of view, Tom is more sympathetic than Daisy.
Of course, that isn’t saying much. I’ve never liked Daisy, and maybe that’s why I didn’t particularly like the book. Maybe this is Fitzgerald’s fault. I’m not sure if he’s pointing out misogyny that existed in that society—i.e. two men see a woman as a kind of prize integral to their own identity, but if the woman is unhappy, there’s no real outlet or avenue for improvement of her situation—or if he’s just the kind of jerk who won’t even let his own unhappy wife write a book about her own life when she’s locked up in a mental institution because they lived the same life and he was writing a similar book. I don’t know if Fitzgerald had difficulty understanding and sympathizing with women or if he was just drawn to crazy women with serious character flaws and emotional problems. But I don’t like Daisy. When I read the book, I didn’t get her at all. (I basically whole-heartedly agreed with Nick’s assessment of Tom and Daisy in the end.) To Carey Mulligan’s credit, the Daisy of the film is a much more warm-blooded and sympathetic (or at least pitiable) creature. I still don’t like her, but I think Mulligan is an immensely talented actress who does an exemplary job here with the material she’s given. She’s a much more nuanced Daisy than we usually see.
Isla Fisher surprised me by turning up as Myrtle Wilson. It’s a surprisingly dramatic role for her, and I think she does a lovely job, and makes the character’s pitiable and despicable qualities tantalizingly palpable in her every glance.
Though not in the movie much, Amitabh Bachchan has a commanding presence and really makes it felt as Meyer Wolfsheim. And Elizabeth Debicki is absolutely too wonderful for words as Jordan Baker (the only character in the novel who interested me at all when I read it as a teen). I’d never heard of Debicki before reading that she’d been cast as Jordan Baker, but I applaud the choice now because she’s perfect (though the character is not left with much to do. Honestly, though she makes an impression, Jordan’s not in the book all that much, but she’s in the movie even less).
Best Scene:
There’s something strangely appealing about the scene when Gatsby starts throwing around all his
imported shirts. DiCaprio’s very good here, as is Carey Mulligan, and Tobey Maguire’s not half bad.
Probably the best moment, though, comes after Daisy’s luncheon guests all decide to take a trip
into the city because it’s so hot. The cast is very talented, and the scene is practically unique in the film because nothing else is happening but human interaction. There’s no glitz or motion or music or distraction. (I’m not saying that it’s silent, but the performances own the moment, not the soundtrack.)
Best Scene Visually:
Obviously the parties at Gatsby’s house are mesmerizing and busy enough to send even the most jaded movie goer into sensory overload. (It’s funny because I go into sensory overload so easily that basically every party seems like this to me, even a child’s birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese.) Seeing all this spectacle in 3D might be too much, but in 2D, I thought it was just right, and I loved the use of the swimming pool.
I think the film also does a great job with the Dr. T.J. Eckleburg, Oculist billboard (which again is not at all subtle in the book) and the stark contrast not only between the Eggs and the valley of ashes but between all kinds of thematically dissimilar elements. This film thrives on glaring disparities.
Funniest Scene:
I don’t remember the book being funny at all—except, I suppose in a way, for the stuff about the butler’s nose—but that’s probably because I read it seventeen years ago (can that be right???), and I didn’t like it or have the time or inclination to linger over it.
But the scene when Nick and Gatsby prepare for the tea party at Nick’s place is pretty funny in the movie. Several other things made me laugh, too, actually, but I find that I can’t remember now what they were.
Best Action Sequence:
I love Gatsby’s yellow car in this movie. I like the way it looks, and I love the way he drives it. I love just about every scene involving the car.
The Negatives:
Perhaps the one true failing of this film is the way it handles the narrator, Nick Carraway. The idea of Tobey Maguire in this role intrigued me. I liked him pretty well as Spider-Man, and I’d like to see him find more success in a greater variety of prominent roles in mainstream films. (Back in the day, I never would have predicted that Elijah Wood would have a better career right now than Tobey Maguire. I’m not knocking Wood, but when you begin as a child star and transition into a hobbit, you’ve got a rough road ahead of you.) Unfortunately, this movie really isn’t doing Maguire any favors. On paper, he sounded like a good choice, but on the screen, he seems miscast or at least struggling with subpar material.
Why in the world is Nick narrating from a snowy madhouse where his only companion is a distractingly distinctively voiced doctor? Forget about the butler’s nose, what is up with that guy? Is he even real? Why does he pace around watering flowers while Nick slowly writes down his story and then even more slowly reads it back to him? I realize the pace is slower back in safe, reliable Middle America, but I don’t think it’s slow enough for a doctor to put a seed in a moist paper towel while his patient begins a novel and then pace around until the patient’s mind and his indoor garden finally bloom in unison. Maybe Baz Luhrmann and Craig Pearce were more inspired by Zelda Fitzgerald than by her husband’s masterpiece when they came up with this clunky and unnecessary device.
The sanitarium scenes just don’t belong in the film. The film doesn’t need them. All the doctor ever does is repeat what Nick says, turning his statements into interrogatives. It’s not like the story is confusing and hard to follow. Aside from Nick, there are only about ten other significant characters. I understand the desire to keep some of Nick’s narration in the film because some of the prose is beautiful and highly effective. But films use voice-over narration all the time. There’s no need to create an otherwise pointless frame story just to show us all where the narrator is currently hanging out. Besides, I thought at moments the narration itself seemed intrusive. Nick could have set the scene, briefly told us Gatsby’s origin story, and then delivered the powerful concluding lines. That really would have been enough.
I’m also not sure why Nick’s relationship with Jordan was cut. (At least, if it was in there, it was so subtle that even Nick didn’t know they were dating.) When I read the book as a teenager, Jordan Baker was easily my favorite character. That’s an understatement. Actually Jordan Baker was the only character in the whole novel that I had the slightest interest in at all (though I did like the idea of throwing lavish parties at my house and never clearly identifying myself as the host. In fact, I still like that idea. So if you ever hear about a big, crazy party thrown at the house of some mysterious, unidentified host—show up! It might be your chance to almost meet me, old sport!)
As I mentioned earlier, Elizabeth Debicki is perhaps the one member of the main cast who was completely unknown to me before this role, but she’s perfectly cast as Jordan. Her performance couldn’t be better. But, as the story progresses, this movie seems to make Jordan a bit more virtuous and straight forward than I remember her. In fact, Movie Jordan is so unoffending that it seems odd when Nick renounces and denounces the lot of them. What has she done?
It’s a serious—and I think self-conscious—departure from the novel to get rid of the Nick and Jordan relationship. For one thing, in the book, Nick is never really focused on the relationship he’s supposed to be participating in because he’s obviously completely obsessed with Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship. This definitely shows that Nick himself has some rather serious character flaws that he never focuses on, an idea completely glossed over by the movie. By not even allowing Nick to be in a not-so-great relationship with Jordan, the movie can spend much more time showing us just how great he is in his relationship with Gatsby.
The good thing about this is that Tobey Maguire and Leonardo DiCaprio have great chemistry together on screen. Some of their scenes are quite funny—and this helps to humanize Gatsby who is a much more real and interesting character here than in previous dramatizations. The problem is, when Nick isn’t around Gatsby, he’s not particularly interesting, well-drawn, multi-dimensional, etc. That wouldn’t be a problem, really, given this production’s decision to make Gatsby the star, except that Nick is still hanging around all the time in those ridiculous scenes in the sanitarium.
Nobody cares if Nick thinks he’s a good writer or not. And the doctor encouraging him to write a book as therapy is just pointless. The story is not about Nick. You can’t take away the few story elements that force us to think about him as a flawed human being and not just a reliable narrator and then expect us to care about what he’s doing with himself now that Gatsby’s not around.
The only other minor complaint I have is with Joel Edgerton’s performance. Once I got used to him, I thought he gave a far-better-than-average performance as Tom. But at first, his voice was just so jarring. He didn’t sound like Tom Buchanan. He sounded like some guy pretending to be Tom Buchanan. That really took some getting used to.
And, in honesty, there were a couple of moments when I thought, This shot is lasting way too long. This seems melodramatic now, or, Okay, so much lingering is over-the-top! But that didn’t happen often enough to turn me against the movie, not by a long shot.
Overall:
Even though the sanitarium scenes are clunky—doubly so because they’re completely unnecessary—I thoroughly enjoyed The Great Gatsby. Baz Luhrmann’s cinematic version of the long-time reading list staple should cause high school English teachers to rejoice. This version is very accessible and should make the spectacle of Nick Carraway’s dazzling and disorienting journey more relatable to teens not particularly interested in books older than their grandparents.
Fans of the book may find much to criticize, but I’m sure if you’re a Gatsby enthusiast, you’ll find a lot to love in this film, too. The entire cast is fantastic, particularly Leonardo DiCaprio, Jason Clarke, and Elizabeth Debicki. And Carey Mulligan and Joel Edgerton make captivating—and almost sympathetic—characters I found vapid and completely uninteresting in the book. The sets and costumes are lavish. The music is not period but is nevertheless rather perfect, I think, in recreating the giddy, dizzying, surreal and increasingly scary and disgusting world of the novel.
Overall, The Great Gatsby delivers exactly what I expected, and I’d be happy to see it again sometime, or possibly even own it on blu-ray.