The Great Gatsby

"3 stars out of 4"

Finally...the much anticipated The Great Gatsby.

Before we start discussing the film let me just have a small moment with movie-goers who don't LOVE movies and only look at them as a source of entertainment (which was probably what the initial intention of making movies was). When you decide to go see a movie and want to invite a friend along with you, go ahead and do it but please, I beg of you, invite a friend who you see frequently! Because, and I couldn't put more stress on this, a cinema theater is not the place to catch up with old friends! There is a nerd sitting nearby who is actually trying to take in every word that is coming out of the mouth of the actors and who doesn't like hearing your gasps of sudden realizations of what other movies you've seen this actor in and make it sound like you've had the discovery of the century. Please...calm down.

The movie...what a vision! The director had used bold colors to show the extravagant lifestyle of these people and specifically that of Gatsby's. No one other than Baz Luhrman could have done it. It reminded me a great deal of his Moulin Rouge. But I had liked Moulin Rouge better. It was one of the movies that made me get interested in the 21st century musicals, and by that I mean musical movies that were made over the last decade, even if their stories were old, like Chicago.

It also reminded me of the new Anna Karenina. These classics have been made more than once in the past by other film makers and a remake wouldn't suffice. That's why they are trying to add new colors, to bring a new dimension to these stories. A new era of remakes, if you will. They try to make unconventional films. I was watching an interview of Scorsese on YouTube and I just remembered that he had done almost the same thing with his Age of Innocence, 20 years ago. I hadn't appreciated it when I got to watch it a few months back but as I get in deeper into his thoughts and images that he had in his mind for his movies, I come to admire him more and see new aspects of his films that I had missed. I wonder if we can call him the father of the new remakes. I am not quite sure if anyone had done anything alike before him.

Anyway every story has been told. This cheesy song came to my mind when I wrote this last sentence, "Every beautiful song has already been sung...lalalalala"! I got a Kindle for my birthday from my friends and before leaving on my trip, copied a selection of my e-books on it and brought it with me, including many screenplays. I have just started reading Being John Malkovich, which unfortunately I haven't got to see yet, by one of the greatest screen writers ever (in my opinion at least...but I'm sure almost everyone would agree), Charlie Kaufman.
There hasn’t been a movie written by Charlie Kaufman that I haven’t liked! I can’t remember if I saw Adaptation first or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but either way, I was struck by the power of cinema in both of them. Eternal Sunshine turned out to be my second favorite movie of all time (second to Forrest Gump). After seeing Adaptation, with my favorite actor Nicolas Cage being nominated for his role in it, I began to admire him even more and my jaw was dropped by his brilliance (Kaufman's I mean). Of course, his masterpiece to this day would definitely be Eternal Sunshine but every single piece he writes is just mind blowing. 

While watching Inside Actors Studio in the episode where the guest was (the adorable and talented) John Cusack, he said that he wanted his production company to make a different movie and he had gone and asked for a script that no one would even touch because it wasn’t doable, and they had given him the script for Being John Malkovich.
The point I wanted to get to from this stray of mind was that I remember this quote from Cameron Diaz (one of the actors in Being John Malkovich) who had said "It's been said that in Hollywood there are only 14 different scripts. Well, this is number 15". I want to say there is more of that new breath needed.

In my opinion, counting in Eternal Sunshine and Adaptation, now the total scripts in Hollywood are 17!

This Gatsby story line, again, seems a lot familiar. Off the top of my head, Aladdin! A penniless boy, falling in love with a rich girl and trying to show himself as a rich person. Of course, in Aladdin the ending was different but I am sure I have seen ones similar to that of Gatsby's. I have no idea why it was chosen the second best novel of all time. I am not sure if the other stories were adapted from Gatsby or it didn't have any novel idea of its own. But what I am guessing is even though other authors might have had the same idea in mind but the way Fitzgerald has verbalized it is what sets his apart.

DiCaprio seemed to be emphasizing a lot on the script at first but soon he fell back into the amazing actor he's become and was comfortable in his role. People have different opinions about movies and actors they see and all that matters is "the eye of the beholder"! After the movie, my sister told me that her friend had not liked DiCaprio in this movie and had said that he's not a good romantic actor. Whereas, my sister told me that for the first time she had liked DiCaprio. My family has never been fond of him! Probably because the first movie we ever saw from him was Titanic and let's be honest, he wasn't really good in it. But maybe it was because my parents disapproved watching movies with love scenes (and they should have because we were kids!) and maybe that's why made us not like him! But I'm not sure. I think this movie wasn't his best work either but he was OK in it. Overall, he's come a long way as an actor.

Sometimes I feel bad about being a critic. I mean, this is the career I would die for but I always ask myself: is this right, what I want to do and am doing? People spending a lot of energy, time, and money and present their work to us and we sit at our desks and type sometimes vicious things! I mean, I am for all that "constructing" criticism but people have different opinions as I mentioned. What makes my opinion worthy and different from others? I must be lucky to have people agree with what I am saying...or I just need to have brilliance as Ebert had!

Back to the movie...I first thought the 3D was unnecessary as I had seen discussions online and explanations by the director...but let me tell you something. This movie was made to caress your eyes. It's like a visionary poem. A fairytale. And without to make this vision stand out, the 3D helped a lot. This movie would not have been half as good without the 3D...maybe that's not fair to say...let's put it this way: you wouldn't have enjoyed it half as much as you did without the 3D. But if you decide to see the non-3D version, it's OK. Don't feel bad.

Now how I grade a movie? After watching a movie, I ask myself "would I be likely to watch this again"? If the answer is "Absolutely" then it means it's a 4 star movie...if I say "with open arms!" it means it's a 3.5 star...if I say "meh...probably" it means it's a 3 star...if I say "it wouldn't hurt", it's 2.5...if my mind says "hopefully not!" then it's a 2..."God no!" is 1.5..."Why did I watch this sh**" is a 1..."somebody show me the bathroom" is 0.5...aaand "kill me...kill me now" or "deadly silence" means disaster or aka 0!

This movie fell somewhere between it doesn't hurt and meh! So I gave it 3 stars. What would make me go back to it would be the music. WOW! Modernized classics to different versions of recent songs.

To give you a brief summary of the plot, in case you don't know it, this story takes place back in the 20's, after the first World War, when "the parties were bigger and liquor was cheap...", an era that Fitzgerald had named the Jazz Age. The story is told by Nick Carraway (played by Tobey Maguire), who might be the biggest admirer of Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio), this mysterious person who almost no one has met and there are different stories from his past. Some say he was an Oxford man, some have heard he's fought in the war,... but nobody knows for sure where he's got his wealth and fame from. One day, Carraway gets invited to one of Gatsby's famous parties for which nobody gets invited and they just show up! But why? Yes, you've guessed it right...there is a girl involved (Daisy played by Carey Muligan) who happens to be Carraway's cousin. He throws these parties for a chance to meet her and has accumulated all this wealth to win her love. But is Gatsby really the person he claims to be? Where has he got all his wealth? And will Daisy be willing to face her husband and tell him she doesn't love him, so she could be with Gatsby?

Back in Iran I remember that my brother had bought it's book and I picked it up one day and after reading only a few pages I got bored! I was talking to my roommate a couple of weeks ago about this and she said "It IS boring"! So, whew! I'm not that weird. What I want to get at is that mid-way through the film, I asked myself if I was bored and the answer was "not at all"! So, to be able to make a movie out of a book that seemed boring in a person's (my) eyes and turn it into an entertaining film earns 3 stars just for that! 

Furthermore, I cannot say that it didn't live up to my expectations from the trailer. I was looking for something upbeat and I got what I came to the theater to find. But maybe it was TOO upbeat...at times I felt the scene was unfinished and it skipped to the next one. It did NOT feel good. You couldn't take in the amount you were supposed to, because you simply didn't have the time to do so. This might be the biggest flaw I found in this movie.

Speaking of DiCaprio, in my sister's graduation ceremony last week, the commencement speech was given by Frank Abagnale Jr (the person whose role DiCaprio played in Catch Me if You Can). He had talked about his life, the frauds in his youth and how he has got married after being released from prison and had been working for the FBI for the past twenty-something years. Now our question was, what were the students supposed to learn from this?! If you don't finish high school and do all sorts of crimes and cheat in everything, you'll end up being successful and work for the FBI?! DA HELL?!

Of course, the only regret he had had was not seeing his dad, who had been a great influence in his life, when he was dying. Maybe it was the down point of his life and the lesson was that if you do something wrong you might miss important moments of your life. I dunno!