The Great Gatsby (2013 film)

Yeah, with Battlefield Earth it just feels like the movie's falling over.

"DAMN! If only we hadn't invaded a planet where everything was tilt" - The Nostalgia Critic

edited 14th Jul '13 8:39:33 PM by maxwellelvis

Compare and contrast: The Great Gatsby to The Wolf Of Wall Street. Now that's one interesting exercise. "Son of God", huh?

So, we're still talking about this? In 2014?

My take: I didn't like it. There were moments that could have worked, but there were so many that didn't. The biggest being, well, the music. The substitution of modern music for 20s music just didn't work (and even when they put in 20s music it was stuff from the late 20s). Of course, for all the bluster about societal context, I still believe it's because somebody thought the kids wouldn't listen to this musty old crap with banjos and tubas and violins...

We're not talking about it except for the one person with a disturbingly irrational hatred of it.

But while we're here, I suppose I should mention that it's gotten Oscar nominations for Best Production Design and Best Costume Design. I expect it to win at least one.

I really loved the movie. I didn't like the book so much since it felt dry (Probably would have liked the book better if I wasn't forced to read it in school) but the movie made things a lot better. Didn't like how they cut Jordan and Nick's relationship, but they did film it?

They filmed a scene where they first kissed and a scene where they broke up. I'm honestly not to sad that it was cut since it would have broken up the pacing.

My mixed on the movie. I definitely think the second half was a lot better than the first. I'm not the biggest fan of Baz Lurman's filming style, and the first half had all of his trademark "All Flash, no substance", but it got better the second Gatsby finally reunited with Daisy.

edited 19th Jan '14 9:07:19 PM by Lionheart0

I brought the discussion back because I've just seen The Wolf Of Wall Street, and the comparison seems inevitable. In both films, Di Caprio plays the central character of a film about the moral vacuity of the upper classes and the bankruptcy (heh!) of the American Dream. He comes to New York with dreams of greatness, and, through his talent and charm, achieves them, at the cost of his morality.

Then we get to the interesting part; the differences. Gatsby is a mild little soap opera where the worst people ever do is get stupid-drunk and then drive. Compared with the madness we see in TWWS, this sounds like a mere pecadillo. On the other hand, given the unreliable narrator (who also is a stock broker), they might have been doing cocaine and opium and orgies and crap and he never saw fit to mention it.

Gatsby himself, in the book, is just an idealistic kid who wanted to become a great man, and he could have too, if he hadn't fallen in love with the wrong woman, and then went in with the wrong crowd in his efforts to earn her back. His Single-Target Sexuality is so strong, evil gangsters feel perfectly safe introducing him to their wives and daughters. He makes terrible displays of wealth, wealth he's gaining mostly through fiscal fraud and fake bonds. But he's very detached from it all. All he wants is Daisy to complete his childish self-picture of awesomeness. Perhaps doing a Leg Cling?

Leo's character in The Wolf Of Wall Street is something else. He's entirely, completely driven by sin. The Seven Deadly Sins. All of them, all of the time. Well, at first he just wanted money (no matter the moral cost), and then he got mentored by a guy who taught him that Hookers and Blow was what it was all about. And then things sort of degenerate from here as he becomes wealthier, hammier, more foul-mouthed, and more pumped in all kinds of brain-frying substances. Also he gets a trophy wife whom he feels incredibly hot for (after dumping the first one), but that doesn't stop him from perpetually fucking around. And his schemes to smuggle his own money around are just plain zany. And, in the end, he falls... except he goes to a country-club, luxury prison, and then bounces back by reinventing himself as a motivational speaker, getting to initiate entire new generations into his style of salesmanship...

Dude, this is the thread for the movie. I love the movie. It's perfect. It's impeccable. Well, okay, maybe a little more bloated than it needed to be. It's the book that is ponderous and sanctimonious and just plain unsatisfactory.

edited 19th Jan '14 9:32:58 PM by TheHandle

Your opinion (right or wrong) and you're entitled to it, I suppose.

Yes, yes, but I want to talk about The Wolf Of Wall Street now, and, perhaps, other stories of people seeking and finding fortune in the stock market in New York, and the moral cost thereof, and how they compare to The Great Gatsby. Hyperbole-prone critics have titled that novel "the definitive story on the American Dream" and so on, but there's hardly anything definitive about it, is there? If anything, it romanticizes the concept through a filter of melancholy and regret, and keeps things civil, discreet and understated, at arm's length. But the Dream keeps getting reinvented, dreamed up all over again by new, hopeful, greedy young men who want to be mighty, and famous, and want to do so right now, who want the world for nothing, who think they're Alexander The Great Financer.

edited 20th Jan '14 5:55:49 PM by TheHandle

You've made your point. And we have a thread for Wolf of Wall Street.

edited 20th Jan '14 4:57:04 PM by Mort08

If I bring the topic there, are they going to tell me that "we have a thread for The Great Gatsby" as well?

Also, no I haven't, this is a totally new point. Before, I was complaining about the novel's emotional distance to the events and its unfair treatment of the characters, and complimenting the film for taking a more sympathetic perspective and making them more likeable without changing what they did. Now, I'm thinking that maybe there were lots of things going on that the narrator politely or self-servingly omitted or downplayed, and I'm interested in comparing the figures of Jay Gatsby and Jordan Belfort. So, yeah, completely new point.

edited 20th Jan '14 5:51:27 PM by TheHandle

You've made your point that you hate the book and love the movie. It's just few people are interested in discussing that anymore. Very few.

But I'm not interested in talking about the book as compared to the movie either (plus, I don't dislike it as much as I had at first, it grew on me; heck, for the puprpose of this discussion, you may assume that I love that book), I'm interested in talking about the social commentary on stock brokers, quick wealth, young ambition, obscene partying, and the American Dream. You think I'm some sort of one-note character that can only approach a story from one angle?

edited 20th Jan '14 10:25:59 PM by TheHandle

This is such a beautiful little film.

[1]

Posting again. These clips, I love them:

• None of us could ignore that fifth guest's slow, metallic urgency.
• Gatsby looked, in that moment, as if he had killed a man.

I just love the way Tobey delivers these lines, and the lines themselves. I'm going to have to read the book again. There's something so personal, so colorful and alive in how Fitzgerald describes things. Gush gush gush gush.