The Great Gatsby is good, actually | Little White Lies

In Praise Of

The Great Gats­by is good, actually

16 May 2023

Two individuals in profile, one man and one woman, with a green circle and abstract patterned background.
Two individuals in profile, one man and one woman, with a green circle and abstract patterned background.
Ten years after Baz Luhrman­n’s auda­cious take on F. Scott Fitzger­ald’s beloved nov­el pre­miered, it’s time to reassess this maligned venture.

In prepa­ra­tion for an Eng­lish class mod­ule on clas­sic F. Scott Fitzger­ald nov­el The Great Gats­by, I sat down and watched the 2013 film adap­ta­tion of the nov­el direct­ed by Baz Luhrmann. Although I should have per­haps read the nov­el first in order to com­pare it to the film, I didn’t, and still had rol­lick­ing time watch­ing Luhrmann and Leo DiCaprio reunite for the first time since 1996’s Romeo + Juliet.

Six years on from my first view­ing – and more cru­cial­ly 10 years on from The Great Gatsby’s debut in cin­e­mas – apart from the occa­sion­al online sneer­ing at the clip of Nick Car­raway (Toby Maguire) writ­ing The Great’ next to Gats­by’ in his draft of the book, and the ever-present gif of Jay Gats­by (DiCaprio) rais­ing a cham­pagne glass while a flur­ry of fire­works explode in the back­ground, its lega­cy is non-exis­tent. How­ev­er, Luhrmann’s faith­ful adap­ta­tion of Fitzgerald’s 1925 nov­el is a kinet­ic romp through the 115-page nov­el that brings bun­dles of Baz ener­gy while stay­ing true to the love sto­ry and tragedy at its core.

The mid­dling crit­i­cal recep­tion the film had on release and its under­whelm­ing box office return can be eas­i­ly under­stood with a vari­ety of the crit­i­cisms valid: the dodgy dig­i­tal effects, the epic run­time, its dif­fi­cul­ties in the por­tray­al of the novel’s phys­i­cal metaphors (such as the green light) and its side-lin­ing of the female char­ac­ters. But when it comes to adapt­ing the Great Amer­i­can Nov­el, there will always be some­thing that gets pushed aside to empha­sise the filmmaker’s point of view. Such is the case for any nov­el to screen adaptation.

While crit­ics were eager to attack the extrav­a­gance of the milieu and the indul­gence of the set-pieces, what they for­get is Luhrmann’s calm after the storm approach. The furore of the open­ing act is a mag­nif­i­cent show­case of max­i­mal­ism – includ­ing one mod­ern cinema’s great­est achieve­ments in the intro­duc­tion of Gats­by, liv­ing up to expec­ta­tion – but Luhrmann knows he can’t sus­tain that pace for the two and a half hour run­time so slows down pro­ceed­ings, focus­ing on char­ac­ters and con­ver­sa­tions over par­ties and bootlegging.

In the film’s last act, Gats­by con­fronts his long yearned for lover Daisy’s hus­band – the über wealthy, old mon­eyed Tom Buchanan (Joel Edger­ton) – over the fact that she doesn’t love him any­more. Luhrmann ratch­ets up the ten­sion, with Gatsby’s façade on the precipice of crum­bling and the fate of his and the woman he so loves future on a knife edge.

The scene is the per­fect eli­sion of Luhrmann’s fre­net­ic edit­ing and cam­era work, the beau­ty of the source mate­r­i­al and exhi­bi­tion of actors at the peak of their pow­ers. Luhrmann and his edit­ing team rarely hold a shot for longer than two sec­onds, cap­tur­ing the des­per­ate cir­cum­stances Gats­by finds him­self in and his yearn­ing to repeat the past ever so quick­ly slip­ping away. His fran­tic but con­trolled edit­ing, con­stant slow zooms, shift­ing of focus, slight pans and wide shots inhab­its the mind­set of Gatsby’s a‑mil­lion-thoughts-a-sec­ond mind while attempt­ing to keep up appear­ances. But for once Luhrmann’s style is not the focal point – it is the actors that take cen­tre stage, most notably DiCaprio.

Man in a white suit standing in an ornate room with floral wallpaper, curtains, and decorative furnishings.

The Great Gats­by arrived in 2013, a few months before Mar­tin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street. Pri­or to the third act con­fronta­tion scene, Gatsby’s extra­or­di­nary gift for hope” was well and tru­ly intact, the pre­tence slight­ly crack­ing but stur­dy; a man as glam­orous as a man could be but clasp­ing to their youth and the past. He is, in essence, the age­ing DiCaprio. When the façade final­ly snaps in his con­fronta­tion with Tom, you see DiCaprio as well as Gatsby.

When his char­ac­ters lose it in The Avi­a­tor or Rev­o­lu­tion­ary Road he’s still hand­some, Hol­ly­wood star Leo; when he los­es it with Tom Buchanan it is scary and real. DiCaprio is whol­ly believ­able as one of the most notable men in lit­er­a­ture, and per­fect­ly cal­i­brates the per­for­mance of a man who is simul­ta­ne­ous­ly suave and tragic.

DiCaprio’s per­for­mance, despite being under­val­ued, wasn’t a main com­plaint for crit­ics and audi­ences in 2013, who saved their ire for Baz Luhrmann him­self. Neg­a­tive reviews, such as Richard Brody writ­ing for the New York­er and Indiewire’s assess­ment of The Great Gats­by seem to praise his sin­gu­lar direc­to­r­i­al tal­ent and his raz­zle daz­zle ten­den­cies, but lat­er dis­re­gard the film due to Luhrmann’s aes­thet­ic inclinations.

There seemed to have been a gen­er­al con­sen­sus that The Great Gats­by was just one step too far, one incon­gru­ous hip-hop song too much. Com­pare that to nine years lat­er when Luhrmann’s most recent direc­to­r­i­al out­ing, Elvis, where he direct­ed Tom Han­ks in a fat suit to one of the most pecu­liar per­for­mances of recent times, and crit­ics and audi­ences could see past it and under­stand what Luhrmann was aim­ing for.

Luhrmann’s 180° crit­i­cal and cul­tur­al re-appraisal is odd as Elvis and The Great Gats­by share a mul­ti­tude of sim­i­lar­i­ties – most cru­cial­ly a switch up of tem­pos. This is per­fect­ly illus­trat­ed by the build up and then flir­ta­tion of Gatsby’s reunion with Daisy. The pent up anx­i­ety of Gats­by, with his over­com­pen­sat­ing pomp and cir­cum­stance, and tick­ing clock empha­sis­ing his agi­ta­tion even­tu­al­ly relax­es into a gen­uine­ly qui­et moment brim­ming with ten­der­ness and hap­pi­ness, which Luhrmann most­ly pro­hibits through­out the film. Luhrmann isn’t a one trick pony, he can ramp up the camp or rau­cous­ness at the drop of an eccen­tric hat, but also dial it back with the same ease.

This is the key to The Great Gats­by. Luhrmann’s film is a respect­ful, lus­cious adap­ta­tion of the nov­el that basks in the prose and char­ac­ters devel­oped by Fitzger­ald, but also brings riotous may­hem from one of Hollywood’s most out­landish auteurs. What makes The Great Gats­by so spe­cial is Luhrmann him­self, who took the most icon­ic work of Amer­i­can lit­er­a­ture and made it his own. He didn’t repeat the past – he trans­formed it.

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