The Great Gatsby

Deb 6      Me 5

First of all, great book. I wasn't that jazzed to see the movie and then seeing it was offered in 3-D I figured it's designed to be more of a spectacle than a story driven film. The opening credits were neat and old time looking, then they morphed into tech. From the first scene the digital effects annoyed me, it looked like a model train set.  And then all the 3D trivialities were a distraction. But there was a narrative that closely followed the book, and Fitzgerald's words gave welcome relief from the hip-hop glory that dominated the movie. It stars Leonardo DiCaprio, a nice looking chap who's star power mocks his talent. We no longer see incredible performances like in What's Eating Gilbert Grape, but a star who shines only in the vacuum of his own space. Other actors were fine, there was a Clark Gable looking guy who was quite credible. What saved this for me were the parts where they stuck with the original text. On The Road suffered from excluding Kerouac's brilliant prose, this interpretation of a great novel used the text as salvation. Its amazing to me, how a film maker can include all the ingredients of opulence and over-the-top staging and still come out flat. The missing yeast would be some exuberance from DiCaprio; he should be in contrast to Tobey Maguire's low key character, but instead acts a bit flatter. I'd guess a directorial flaw. I'm sure that making a film like this is expensive and the use of blue screen effects makes for safer, more cost effective production, but the car racing scenes were ridiculous and the coal mining town is just a digital nightmare.

Watch it, it has amazing parts, but listen to it, there's a great story behind the effects.