The Great Gatsby

Published in 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby is one of the most important books of American modernism. It's no wonder, then, that this tragic romantic drama has been adapted to film several times. After three screen adaptations and a TV version, film adaptation number five is now coming to cinemas with Australian Baz Luhrmann's colourful 3D version. But the question rightly arises whether opulent 3D visuals and modern hip-hop and soul sounds are enough to get audiences excited about this story again.

Purely dramaturgically, Moulin Rouge director Luhrman sticks closely to the classic original. Set in 1922 on Long Island in New York State, the story is told by young up-and-coming writer and stockbroker Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire), who comes to New York from the Midwest in hopes of getting a piece of the great American dream. He moves into a small cottage right next door to the lavish estate of the mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio), who is a complete mystery to most, even though the city's upper class regularly attend his debauched, luxurious parties. Nick only knows his cousin Daisy (Carey Mulligan) and her husband Tom (Joel Edgerton) here, who live across the bay. But after he gets an invitation to one of Gatsby's parties one day, that changes abruptly. Nick befriends the charismatic millionaire and is introduced by him to a world that is completely new to him. But this friendship comes with an ulterior motive. When Gatsby asks Nick for a big favor involving, of all things, Daisy, a story of unrequited love and unshakable dreams opens up for the young man that seems doomed to end in tragedy.

The Great Gatsby was originally scheduled to hit theaters in the summer of 2012. The last-minute postponement was explained by the studio as purely marketing motivated, but left a bit of an unpleasant aftertaste. The trailer for the film then suggested that Baz Luhrmann was merely copying himself here and would tell the classic story in a very colorful Moulin Rouge look. This didn't really appeal to many people. And indeed, the parallels between the two films are undeniable. This already starts with the soundtrack, where contemporary sounds are mixed with 20s sounds. This sometimes takes some getting used to, but works very well overall. Visually, Luhrmann also stays true to the style of his two-time Oscar winner. Colorful, artificial and full of kitsch, but also fascinatingly indulgent and with great set and costume design presents the rush of images, through which the viewer is drawn directly into the world of Jay Gatsby.

What Luhrmann manages amazingly well here with his very own and admittedly still a bit of getting used to style, is to make the story seem completely timeless. That's a bit of a feat, since the language and set-up are clearly set in the 1920s, and younger viewers in particular would thus actually lack a surface to identify with. But the director succeeds not only musically in building a bridge between old and new and thus revealing how topical the story actually is. The extreme superficiality, which can be observed at the indulgent parties, corruption, the dream of a better future and parallels to the current financial crisis make the story seem very modern. And the visual realization finally makes sure that even the last antiquated dust of the great Gatsby is blown away.

The film can also benefit from its well-chosen actors, with Leonardo DiCaprio clearly stealing the show from his co-stars here. Tobey Maguire, Carey Mulligan and especially Joel Edgerton deliver solid performances, but their mimicry is a bit limited. DiCaprio, on the other hand, is allowed to display a wide range of his skills, making his Gatsby a mysterious, profound and touchingly tragic figure, who fills the often deliberately very artificial events with a great deal of humanity.

The Great Gatsby is opulent set-piece cinema, a visual frenzy that will surely divide opinions. Not everyone will succeed in letting Luhrmann draw them into his very own version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel. But those who do will be transported into a fascinating world in which a story unfolds that is truly magnificent in its tragedy, and which has lost little of its appeal, strength and topicality even almost 90 years after its first publication. Therefore, whether in 2D or 3D, The Great Gatsby should definitely be experienced on the big screen. If you like great emotional cinema, don't mind visual kitsch, and like Baz Luhrmann's earlier films, this is one you shouldn't miss! Absolutely worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp