I'm no big Baz Luhrman fan (The Australian anyone?) but thought he couldn't go wrong with Gatsby: lavish parties, great dresses, good casting choices.
Sure winner, I thought. I was looking forward to it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2013/may/06/the-great-gatsby-baz-luhrmann-reviews
And yet the reviews are mixed.
Anyone seen it yet? Has he arsed it up or is it a triumph?
I think Baz did Moulin Rouge, which is the only movie I can remember watching in the past fifteen years that I couldn't get through - which is saying a lot, I sat through Solaris for cripes sake!
I doubt Gatsby will be any good - but like the movie-sucker that I am, I am sure I will get it on Netflix in five months time from now. I hope it's good, I'd rather be wrong and not have my time wasted, but I won't hold my breath on this one.
BTW - Catcher in the Rye is the better novel over GG.
Oh I don't know if I even want to see it, but I probably will. The trailer turned me off completely. Leonardo does not spell out Gatsby to me, and I don't trust that he can project the reflective and introspective nature of Gatsby. And Toby McGuire is still a goofy kid to me.
The only one I can buy (from the trailer) is Daisy.
I liked Moulin Rouge... quite a bit...
I expect it to be terrible. I can get behind DiCaprio as Gatsby, but not McGuire as Nick. I feel like that is going to ruin it right from the start for me. The preview made it look like...well it looked like Moulin Rouge. Which is fine for Moulin Rouge, I guess, but not for The Great Gatsby.
I love that book and I've always wanted to see a good movie version, simply because I think it is possible. The only thing is, the cast has to be stellar, because it's driven by those complex characters. I'll eventually watch it, but I don't expect to be happy about it.
Adaptations are tricky because they're playing with people's preconceived ideas. I don't put much stock into what film critics say because most of them are just too full of themselves. My guess is I'll probably enjoy it, but it won't change my life, pretty much how I felt about the book.
Fun fact: I live about 500 feet from F. Scott Fitzgerald's grave. Not sure why I want you to know that, but there it is. Enjoy!
I just started reading the book for the first time and I'm already wondering why anyone would see film material in it. Not because I don't like it (I do so far) but I don't see it translating as engaging film material.
I think people expect it to translate well to film because it's basically one long party and party scenes tend to be awesome in film. My impression of the book was that it's a bunch of not very interesting characters sitting around not doing very much interesting, except drinking and dying, and even then lacklusterly. Though, yeah, I can totally see why people love it.
Baz Lurhmann flicks seem to be about pretty colors and wooden performances, so I thought it'd be a good match for this adaptation. If the focus of this film is strictly on big lavish set designs and people dressed in cool pretty clothes it would be okay by me. The trailer looks like that Tin Tin cartoon though.
I do quite like Luhrmann's STRICTLY BALLROOM. Or did, back in the 90's, anyway.
I have no idea why this film needs to be in 3D. That's Baz for you, as gaudy and over the top as usual.
Roll on only god forgives, that's looking ace all over.
I never cared for the book, and I'm not a L.D.'s fan. I'm really hoping that it turns out well because it looks interesting, but I just can't see it happening.
EDIT: Literally looks interesting, as in the visuals might be neat.
The fact that they feel like they have to add in the gimmick of 3D makes me extremely skeptical.
@Deets CitR better than GG? May you be cursed to live with a red deerstalker permanently attached to your head!
@Tim Johnson - I am so putting that in the Blagger's Guide to Fitzgerald (currently in preparation)
Yep, consensus is it's going to be crap. Oh bother. But I will see it if only for Carey Mulligan and Joel Edgerton who are both fab in everything.
And it also means DiCaprio won't get an Oscar which is good because he is so patently desperate for one it's annoying.
http://www.nextmovie.com/blog/baz-luhrmann-leonardo-dicaprio-oscar/
@Cath - So the Oscar is still a serious thing? I thought it was some place between World's Greatest Grandpa and middle school BFF.
Did anyone enjoy the first movie attempt with Robert Redford, and Sam Waterston as Nick?
I've always been WAY more a fan of Catcher than Gatsby, but I don't hate pro-Gatsby people. I just feel pity for them. ;)
Not sure what Baz was thinking making at least the trailer look like Gatsby is a psycho, because I always pictured him as too buttoned up for his own good. Having Leo screaming and making melodramatic faces just feels completely against the premise of who the character is. Maybe it's just me.
Well, Holden and Gatsby are just two completely different types of people. It's natural some would relate more to one than the other.
Holden is a young guy without much life experience and he's looking at everything with sort of a fresh cynicism. He's just discovering the bullshit of the world and finds it newly depressing. Where Gatsby is older with more life experience. His complex is going home again, and his tragedy is that it isn't possible.
I'm about as anti Baz Luhrman as it gets. The over hyper editing, the cornea scaring color schemes, the horrific performances. He's like a hyperactive eight year old who just discovered Microsoft Paint. Still, I think I'm going to see Gatsby. If anything, his style of filmmaking might just match the decadence of the time period. The problem lies with the casting, which is awful. I'm not expecting anything great, but it just might be a visual spectacle, if nothing else.
I don't have anything against people who like Catcher in the Rye, but I didn't read it until I was in my 20's and I spent the whole time wishing I could smack the taste out of that little punk's mouth. Holden is just such a little snob with a stick up his ass that I found him completely intolerable.
I don't see what he has to do with Fitzgerald's masterpiece though, or how the two are even tangentally related.
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I do hope they make Catcher into a 3D film though, now that you mention it. It would be much funnier, you know, since it would kinda come off as "phony"
Why is the debate between those two books specifically?
By the way, Holden liked Gatsby...
I was wondering the same, Liana. It's like comparing bicycles to rollerskates... they both have wheels, but after that the comparison is lost on me.
Someone somewhere will have written an academic thesis comparing the two. Trust me on that.
Isn't it a shame that DiCaprio is now too old to play Holden? Now there's a role with Oscar winning potential.
*spends 0.0000001 of a second feeling sorry for Leonardo*
I LOVED the 1974 version ('such beautiful shirts!'). Darn. Now I have to go and watch it again.
Someone somewhere will have written an academic thesis comparing the two. Trust me on that.
I don't doubt it for a moment.
I was put off it by the trailer.
Catchers already been made. Kinda....igby goes down
I liked it well enough, but there were parts that annoyed me. The excessive violins in the background of every scene, the fact that Nick is telling the story from a sanitarium, and sometimes the bright, vibrant colors were just a little too much. But it was enjoyable.
I saw it Monday in 3D and I'm really starting to dig the way it (3D tech that is) kicks out the "Z" dimension of the screen till it's literally in your face. In just that way were some of the iconic motif's of Gatsby popped out -- the green light across the bay to East Egg, the city of ash, the towering proximity of Gatsby's place -- and that alone made it worth the price of admission for me. (Notwithstanding the $3.95 surcharge for the 3D which was unforgivable.)
On the other hand the operatic tone of the soundtrack got downright farcical at times and I don't think Fitzgerald ever intended that. But on the whole the liberty he took with injecting Jay Z modernity into the tone of his production left me saying "why not?". Still though, some of Baz's prose tampering was laughable. Nick's "within and without" voiceovered epiphanies of which there were two left me yearning for more F Scott Fitzgerald purity and less George Harrison plagiarism.
No he didn't arse it up except in one way -- the most unfortunate casting of Tobey Maguire as Nick Carraway. Avery, you were O so right about this. Whoever the hell his agent is, he or she must have a hell of a lot of clout. Otherwise I don't see how he could have been allowed to inhabit these same luminous dreamscapes as for example the tall saphire-eyed seductress (Elizabeth Debicki) who portrayed Jordan Baker. Maguire must be well into his 30's by now but he still comes across on the silver screen as a kid, a broken down punk and Nick Carraway was never that.
@big_old_dave: that film was a version of Catcher? I've got to get hold of a copy now you've said that, I really had no idea it was anything like it!
Finished reading the book last week...hard to imagine why the need for 3D even after having read Jeff's description. Will definitely have to go and see it for myself.
@chacron: igby is not a direct film version of catcher but it's heavily influenced by it. The film is the closest thing to a filmed adaptation of the novel we may ever get. The main characters both failed out of prep school and have incredibly cynical outlooks on life but Igby Goes Down creates its own world, a little cracker of a film, hope you enjoy :))
Loved Igby a lot!
I never felt that Holden or Igby were unjustifiably cynical. I always thought both of them were just much more realistic and observant than typical boys their age. Maybe I'm cynical and can't see it in others, who knows.
Who I always thought would be an amazing Holden was Anton Yeltchin. He might be getting too old for that role (which would never happen anyway) but if he wouldn't work, my other choice would be Freddy Highmore. He seems so sweet and wholesome, but I also see a hidden angst in him, a sort of disappointment with humanity that would work well as Holden.
But, yeah, I know the two (Catcher and Gatsby) aren't related at all, other than Holden liking Gatsby. I just saw someone mention Catcher in an earlier post on this thread, so I had to step in because Holden is a god to me.
Tobey Maguire's father-in-law is the head of Universal studios @Jeff, which may answer your question about how he got the part, although (pace I haven't seen the film yet) I think Maguire isn't a bad choice. He's a very passive actor and therefore suited to the role of observer, which Carraway essentially is. DiCaprio as Gatsby bothers me more. I'm not sure Leonardo can tone down his essential smugness enough to get at Gatsby's inner emptiness and panic. Daisy is the only person he can imagine anchoring him - or possibly the pursuit of Daisy - we're never quite sure which.
Still waiting to see it. Waiting....
@Cath: That explains so much.
