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[FearfulJesuit]

Oh, shush, guys. I'll go watch it and enjoy the special effects and the atmosphere, regardless of whether it was true to the book. That's half the point of watching any movie about the 20s, anyways.

Also, people dissing the green light: can it. The last page of the book is quite possibly the most brilliantly penned in the history of English-language literature.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Because destroying literary milestones doesn't matter as long as it has pretty 3D.

[Frumple]

If that's all it takes to destroy a literary milestone, I'm not sure I'd call it much of a milestone

[10ebbor10]

I still propose that the OP spoiler must be spoilered.

Not all forumites are English/ American. And I for one hadn't read it. Was planning though.
 

[nenjin]

Fitzgerald is probably turning in his grave with this movie adaptation. Yeah, Great Gatsby is all about how glamorous and awesome it is to be rich. Awesome parties and stuff, right? Not about moral corruption and how excessive luxury just hides inner emptiness but hey, long as it's a good Titanic-like love story the girls will see it.

Great Gatsby is one of the my favorite novels, and seeing this:

Hurts me.

Yeah, lets rewrite the entire story and make it appeal to big audiences. Jay-Z, Beyonce, what else can we add? Oh yeah, Leonardo Di Caprio and 3D!

I really gotta say what bothers me, though, is Nick being written so that he's in an insane asylum the entire movie. Go read the book and tell me how well that flows with Nicks actual story. The literal entirety of the point of the book is Nick seeing how corrupt and in excess these 'powerful' rich people are, and becomes disillusioned with the fact that people who seem to have nothing actually are happy with their lot. I dunno. Just bothers me straight to my bones to see such a classic 'Don't be a fuck who only cares about outside appearances and money' tale of honest to god America being torn apart and rewritten for a glitzy-Hurdur-Lio-is-so-cute-check-out-that-3D-flyover crowd.

The changes are not only big but entirely point-changing. The focus changes from Nick to Gatsby in such a big way that I feel the director was literally throwing anything at the board to make 'his' rendition popular. And to someone like me it only brings up bile.

I'm done now. But you can tell how I care about this book.

So basically, the movie manages to be what Fitzgerald was trying to say about his America at the time.

And is it just me, or does every director who remakes an American classic always manage to find a relative of the original author, who thinks their work is a brilliant homage? Saw the director on Colbert saying this and for a moment in buoyed my hope that the movie might be true. But Carraway in an asylum?

Really, the full court media push, from TV shows to dozens of news articles, made me suspicious. When the Colbert show devotes an entire episode to a Gatsby theme (literally, the entire format was given over to talking about the movie), I feel the cold dead hand of the media conglomerate at work.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Oh, shush, guys. I'll go watch it and enjoy the special effects and the atmosphere, regardless of whether it was true to the book. That's half the point of watching any movie about the 20s, anyways.

Indeed. I think one of the reasons it hit me so hard was the contrast in Gatsby's mansion at the beginning with the party, when he and Daisy are spending time together in the almost-empty building, and...well, at the end.

Also, people dissing the green light: can it. The last page of the book is quite possibly the most brilliantly penned in the history of English-language literature.

It also manages to sum up the general idea of the novel, unless the passage I'm thinking of wasn't on that page.

And yeah. Having such lavish special effects and whatnot really hammers in the decadence of the era. Those who care about such things can see that (especially when contrasted with the Valley of Ashes and, of course, the end), those who can't get to see the pretty special effects. Just about as good a compromise as can be achieved between Fitzgerald fans and the LCD of society.

[Starver]

Shakespeare's great and all that, but it's much better to read his plays in your own time and speed rather then having to analyse just what Romeo and Juliet were going on about and what their relationship together meant in the whole scheme of things.

I was going to say something along these lines, myself.  I liked Shakespeare, myself, long before it was ever brought up in school.  But the lessons in Shakespeare were... not the most inspiring.

Technically accurate, looking at the meter of the prose, identifying dramatic themes, having us memorise various speeches ("Friends, Romans, Countrymen...!"[1], "He jests at scars, that never felt a wound; But soft...!", etc)...  All very useful if we were to go on to the classical stage, but in any given theatre the audience tends to (ought to!) outnumber the players by dozens (or even hundreds!) to one...  And the lessons... ahem... lessened the tendency for us to to ever want to see any Shakespearean play.  (Never stopped me, of course.  But I've still never recited lines of Shakespeare for pay[2], and I somewhat doubt anyone else in that class got anywhere close, either.)


I'm not saying it wasn't useful to learn some things about the meaning of the plays, but (in a play totally uncovered by either the English or specifically English Literature classes I took, fortunately!), I'd already worked out what "A rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead!" meant when I was far younger...  Watch the plays and if they're done well enough to draw you in you'll surely get the context.  (OTOH, being forced to take parts, whilst sitting at cramped desks, and reading the plays out sight-unseen was soul-destroyingly tedious and pretty much had no value at all.)

How would I have taught Shakespeare?  I don't know.  But not like that.  Perhaps go to see some productions.  I've seen some particularly good versions of The Tempest[3] and Hamlet[3] in the last few years...  Big budget productions, in many ways, but I've also seen Richard III performed in the courtyard of an old-style inn with just as much reason to pay rapt attention despite there being barely any scenery on the rickety old stage, and the players being pretty much amateur in status.


(Oh, and I've never read TGG, but have heard a couple of audio dramas of same.  Not being a 'Merkin was probably one of the reasons it never got ruined taught in school. )



[1] So very well remembered that very recently I was tempted to reword that to "Friends,  Miners, Yorkshiremen, I come to bury Thatcher, not to praise her...", except that my intent would have been the opposite of the original, and "...the noble Blunkett has told you she was vicious, and Blunkett is an honourable man" wouldn't have deserved the implicit <nod nod, wink wink> of the original.

[2] OTOH, I've been an extra in a Shakespearean film.  Non-talking part, for a flat fee.  The film did quite well, actually, but as I've not even manage to identify myself, on-screen, so anonymous was I among the crowds, so it's never been a verifiable bragging right at all, amongst those who know me by sight.

[3] Hmmm... Just occurred to me that as the former starred Derek Jacobi and the latter had John Simm in the title roll, it's a pity I can't add anything featuring Roger Delgado to that list...  (Not that everyone reading this will understand why, without looking them up to try to find the link... )

[GreatWyrmGold]

"A Doll's House"...Ibsen?

[FearfulJesuit]

Ibsen is the bomb. I read Hedda Gabler on a whim once. Loved it.

[penguinofhonor]

I wouldn't expect you to understand underlying themes anyway, it's okay.

Next up: To kill a mockingbird, the story of how Atticus gets his girl!

First off, why wouldn't you expect that of me? Do you think I'm some sort of oaf?

Second, just because something is an "underlying theme" doesn't mean it's special. If nobody cares about it, it can go.

[Loud Whispers]

Second, just because something is an "underlying theme" doesn't mean it's special. If nobody cares about it, it can go.

If Mictlantecuhtli is right then it's like selling Anne Frank's diary to endorse Nazism. Fitzegerold hated the rich with a passion, it wasn't an underlying theme, it was the spine to the story amidst the vapid, shallow characters.

[GreatJustice]

The fastest way to make someone dislike a book is to force them to read it in high school.

Anyway, my main problem with Gatsby is very simple: unlike some books, the "important" bits really don't stand out. When going through Shakespeare, or Lord of the Flies, or Animal Farm, or most other high school lit books, you can tell what's "important" pretty easily, meaning you can skip over the prose itself like a pebble over a pond, slow down when you see something "important", and make a good essay or test response without having paid much attention. In Gatsby, however, the "super important" stuff that you're supposed to memorize is practically hidden in the text, with a sentence or two on clothing being incredibly important and description taking precedence over action. That's another problem; not very much happens, really, so knowing "what happens" in the novel won't cut it.

[Loud Whispers]

Isn't that everything a book taught in schools should be?

[Zrk2]

Won't it be hilarious if a bunch of high school students start talking about stuff that is in the movie but not in the books in english classes?

Oh it's coming.