The Great Gatsby (2013) - 7 stars out of 10

The Great Gatsby (2013) - 7 stars out of 10

"The Great Gatsby" was really good but it wasn't great.  The trailers set a very high expectation for the artistic vision and, while it achieved that visual splendor in many of the scenes, it didn't carry from the start of the film to the end.  It needed to be all-or-nothing when Director Baz Luhrmann took a risk with his modernist approach to the 1920's story, but he sometimes held back and the film fell short.  "Moulin Rouge" is one of my favorite films because, while Luhrmann's vision is bizarre, it makes the film unforgettable.  "Gatsby" gets stuck in the middle, sometimes pushing the envelope (like the incredible car chase scene) but sometimes retreating back to F. Scott Fitzgerald's original world.  The rap soundtrack captured the essence of Gatsby's parties but didn't work for the core of the story.  I did love how they turned songs like Beyonce's "Crazy In Love" into old-timey tunes.  During the first scene, Craig Armstrong's incidental soundtrack music actually made me say  "I'm going to like this film" out loud.  While I was bothered that the artsy approach wasn't consistent from start to finish, the acting was.  Leonardo DiCaprio is as charming as ever as Gatsby, Tobey Maguire (who I usually cannot stand) actually delivered his roll without any overtly bad acting, and Carey Mulligan was lovely as Daisy.  I could not help but wish that I could just be friends with these lead characters and live happily ever.  Joel Edgerton brought the perfect amount of grit to Tom, particularly by eliminating any sympathy through his early infidelity.  The biggest surprise of the film for me was Isla Fisher as Myrtle.  Movies like "Wedding Crashers" have put her into a box but it's so great to see her breaking out into "real" roles..  Finally, the main draw for this film is the fantastic story.  It has the perfect amount of surprises and ends just the way that it needs to, even though an ending that we wish we could change.  Luhrmann's "The Great Gatsby" didn't live up to the hype but it was an awesome introduction to this story and now I cannot wait to discover the 1974 Robert Redford version.