You're probably wondering if this thread is about the 2013 Baz Luhrmann film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, the 1974 Jack Clayton film starring Robert Redford, the forgotten 1926 and 1949 film adaptations, or just the original novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

All of the above, but right now mostly the 2013 film since that is what inspired this thread.

I tend to go overboard on movies I like, so let me be perfectly clear---this movie is NOT the greatest movie of all time, nor do I think it was necessarily robbed of Oscar nominations or trophies. But this is a gorgeous looking movie and when I saw it on HBO I regretted both (a) not recording this in high definition (I thought ALL movies on HBO were in HD---my mistake), and (2) not seeing this film in theatres. I suspect this may be one of the few 3-D movies made today where it really is worth it to pay the extra money to see it in 3-D. Suprisingly, this film makes me want to re-read the original novel because Luhrmann is smart enough to know that he or his screenwriters are better than Fitzgerald himself. A lot of the book is quoted directly, and the movie ends on the same lines as the book, which are also engraved on Fitzgerald's grave. (I should know because I live a short distance away from it.)

Before I start blabbing away, does anybody else want to share anything about it---even it's only to say that I'm crazy and the DiCaprio movie royally sucked?

No, actually I was wondering how you were going to make it a thread about you, rather than the subject.

It didn't suck, but the music choice did. I actually really enjoyed it. The CGI'd old New York was incredible, the performances quite good, and they stuck to the book fairly well. But the decision to use Jay-Z music was disastrous. They should have gone with "period sounding" updated stuff if they didn't want to stick with actual period music. You can have a little back beat, even a little synth if you must, as long as it sounds "jazzy" and 1920s. But fucking Jay-Z. Completely out of place. Killed any desire I might have had to ever see the movie again.

I think Baz Luhrmann was afraid that 100% period music would drive away potential moviegoers. I think a really good jazz soundtrack would have enhanced the visuals and reinvoked interest in period music. But just because I wasn't interested in the songs on the soundtrack didn't mean that I wasn't interested in the movie. To me, Luhrmann did a great job capturing the greed and energy of 1920's New York, even if the music wasn't what Fitzgerald's characters heard and danced to.

If there is a weakness, it isn't in the music. Towards the end of the novel, Nick Carroway says to Jay Gatsby, "They're a rotten crowd. You're worth the whole damn lot of them put together." For The Great Gatsby to truly work as a film, the audience has to believe that, and I don't quite believe that. Why? Can't pin down the reason, but it may be that as beautiful as this film is, it's as shallow as the world that it depicts. Then again, I may be overcompensating my tendencies to praise movies to the skies, so that every movie I like has to be better than Citizen Kane.

Interesting that this film has Carroway as a stand-in for Fitzgerald, writing The Great Gatsby at the conclusion of the movie. Reading Fitzgerald's biography on Wikipedia, he sounds much closer to Jay Gatsby than Nick Carroway, which gives a whole new meaning to Fitzgerald's term "I was within and without." In describing Gatsby, Fitzgerald may have been talking about his own youthful ambition and idealism, but doing so from a third-person perspective---looking in from without.

Ah, this is another "Eddie's blog substitute" thread. I must be wrong about why I didn't like the movie, because the music "isn't a weakness", and everything else I said you ignored. Carry on.

You're not wrong. It bothered you, but it didn't bother me.

I found the book too depressing. Not interested in seeing any film versions.

That said, Toby Maguire was inspired casting as Nick.

Some film critic---Stephen Hunter?---said that Toby Maguire was one of those actors who are going to look like a teenager when they're pushing 50. He has a point. In the book and movie, Maguire's character is 30, when he was actually 36 when the movie was shot. He was perfect in playing the innocent narrator who is both corrupted and appalled by the events of the movie.

When I was in school, I made a huge mistake when reading the book. Our teacher had us watch the Robert Redford movie, and I was shocked to realize that all the "T.J. Eckleberg" references were to a giant billboard. I got it in my head that there really was a guy named T.J. Eckleberg watching over the roadway. This is incredibly stupid because I can go through my Kindle book and see parts where Fitzgerald explicitly mentions that it is indeed a billboard advertisement.

I've only ever seen the 1940s movie version. Seems like it was fairly faithful to the book.

There was a forgotten (and perhaps now lost) silent version way back in 1926, just a year or so after the novel came out. That has to be one of the fastest film adaptations of a bestselling novel ever.