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Wednesday 22 May 2013

The Great Gatsby - A Review


Alright I just really wanted to get this off my chest. And you should remember that this is only MY opinion. If you have any other opinions, well that's yours. So I really wanted to watch this movie ever since I heard it was coming out because I have studied parts of this novel before in my high school. I did not read the entire book I admit, but I read enough to know that it's an early 90s movie.

True enough, I checked Wiki and the whole story was set in the summer of 1922. What I don't get is why this movie kept playing weird songs which are not even close to the era. I did not have to be a musical genius to tell that the songs are friggin from the wrong era.
And then I found out why I felt that way, most of the songs played in the movie were by JayZ.


Come one. You wanna use rap music in the early 90s then don't choose somebody who only started writing rap music in the late 90s, and early 20s which people like us from twentieth century know.

Plus, I did a little research and rap music was only born in the 1970s.

Seriously, do you think that those people who were rich and living in aristocracy around that era would listen to anything 'street' like? NO of course not. Even Jazz was not accepted among the upper class then. To even begin with, rap did not exist in the 1920s at all!

And worse of all, some people who have not even watched the film came up to me and asked me not to  simply judge if I did not know how to enjoy a movie.
Geez, if all critics enjoyed every single movie produced, I think they would have already gone bankrupt. In fact I don't even think the word 'critic' would have existed!


Back to the movie, the visual effects in The Great Gatsby can be easily seen as 'trying too hard' in my opinion. When I watched the first half of the movie, I realised that hey, the way this show was directed was very familiar. The bright wild colours, the sudden bursts of energy.Then I realised where I've seen these similar visually colourful concepts before.

It was Moulin Rouge.

And yes, indeed both Moulin Rouge and The Great Gatsby were by the same director - Baz Luhrmann.

I have to admit I loved Moulin Rouge so much more compared to The Great Gatsby. It somehow seemed more original, and it was truly a visual feast.

Yes, some of the scenes were beautiful in The Great Gatsby. Like this part where the curtains flowed  through the room and everything was captured with such grace in the camera.

However, alot of the scenes in The Great Gatsby were not developed well enough to touch the audience's mind and heart. For instance, it was the passion between Daisy and Gatsby throughout the movie which was completely a mess. Daisy just seemed scared everytime she was with Gatsby. It was as though she did everything for Gatsby out of fear, not love.

Most of the cast were alright I guess. Leonardo diCaprio was full of emotion and I felt he did a fair share on his part. He was cool and charming when he had to be, and scary and intimidating when he was supposed to be (he loses his temper in one part). Daisy was played by Carey Mulligan, and her acting seemed pretty flat to me. As I said, she looked scared most of the times. LOL. I mean if that was how she was supposed to be then... okaaaay, whatever pleases you. But cmon girl, that was the man you are supposedly to be in love with, and have been separated through war. On top of that, the man you're now married to does not even give a shit about you, so can you just look like you've never known love in your life before and make this look like the best thing that's ever happened to you (while it lasts) so that the audience can at least relate to both of you??

Ok I'm mad at Daisy/Carey Mulligan.

Tobey Maguire played the role Nick Carraway, and he did a pretty good job. He as well had emotion and emotion is important alright. His facial expressions showed what was going on in his mind and his narration was expressive enough to help audiences relate to what he was feeling. And yes in the end I did feel disgust on the society they were living in, like how Nick Carraway was disgusted by it. That was the only message in my opinion that was delivered well.
There are a lot of mixed reviews for this movie, like IMDB rated it a 7.5/10 while Rotten Tomatoes deemed it rotten at 49%, where the average rating was 5.8/10.

So if you are a big fan of the book or have been waiting for this movie to come out since forever, don't let my review bring your spirits down. Go ahead watch it, and then form your own opinion. 

There ain't no right or wrong :)



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