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The Fairviewer

The news site of Verona High School

The Fairviewer

The news site of Verona High School

The Fairviewer

Gatsby Film Worth the 12 Bucks

The long anticipated movie version of The Great Gatsby, directed by Baz Luhrmann, premiered in theatres in mid-May. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire, and Carey Mulligan, Gatsby took the box office by storm.

The weekend opening of Gatsby generated a surprising $51 million. Most critics did not believe the film was very good, however according to Rotten Tomatoes, a very popular movie review website, the general audience liked the movie. On Rotten Tomatoes Gatsby received an 84 percent approval by the people, compared to the 49 percent critics gave it. Tom Charity, a top critic from CNN.com believes Gatsby is “misconceived and misjudged, a crude burlesque on what’s probably American literature’s most precious jewel.”

While on the other hand, an audience member commenting on the same Rotten Tomatoes site said it is “the most unique film adaptation for the book ever.”

After the film was in theatres for a few days, I heard many different opinions on it from my own peers. Some felt it was better than any other film adaptation and each actor was perfectly cast, others felt differently. They believed it was far too digitized and fake, with the director and graphics team not even trying to disguise the fact most of the scenery was created by using a computer.  Another area of the movie that provoked a lot of comment was the film’s soundtrack. Some viewers are confused as to why songs by Jay-Z are in it when the film is so clearly set in the 20’s. Others liked the idea of giving an American classic a modern twist.

In my opinion, I thought the movie was mediocre. I walked into the theatre hoping Luhrmann would do a good job of capturing the novel’s old style rather than creating a modern version of it. Although the actors were fine, I thought someone other than Joel Edgerton could have played a better Tom Buchanan. I did enjoy one thing about the film, however. As it progresses you notice that every quote is almost directly out of the novel. The one thing the creators of Gatsby did well was create a script that was faithful to Fitzgerald’s novel and I applaud them for that. Nowadays, many film adaptations are so far from the original script that viewers cannot even tell what book the movie is attempting to portray.

Although I am not swooning over this movie, I do recommend people to see it in theatres. It could have been a little bit better, but it also could have been a lot worse. In conclusion, the 2013 film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s American classic, The Great Gatsby, is worth the 12 bucks you need to spend to see a movie.

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