Review of The Great Gatsby (2013) by Francis R — 11 Mar 2016

The Great Gatsby: Movie vs. Book.

Sometimes books can be very contrasting with movies. Movies often tend to exclude some insignificant scenes, due to having a time limit. Movie directors also alter or add more scenes for more impacts and impressions. The film makers can enhance the visualization of the stories, whereas in the book, the author includes plenty of details which expresses the meanings and symbolisms in depth. These differences between the movie and the book is also spotted in the book The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and the movie based on it. Personally, I think movies are easier to follow and understand, as it is for majority of the people.

One of the obvious differences between the movie and the book is the framing. In the book, the author sets the narrator as Nick, him being the closest with the main characters, Gatsby and Daisy. The book starts with an opening scene where Nick starts describing his background. He opens the chapter with the quote his dad would advise him, "Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone, just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had." The story is almost always linear, sometimes including flashbacks. However, the movie starts off with Nick talking with his psychiatrist about Gatsby. From the beginning, we get the hint that the story will be most likely based on Gatsby. The framing in the movie is Nick telling the story of what has happened in the past with Gatsby, and soon writes a book about it. There is a possibility that the movie director made it so that the book Nick wrote in the movie might be the real book that was published, but the author leaves the audience left with inquiries.

Another recognizable alteration in the film is when Wilson discovers that the car that ran over Myrtle Wilson was Gatsby's car. The book does not mention the part where Tom confesses the owner of the car to Wilson. By putting the scene in the movie to make it more direct, it helped the viewers to clear things up. The readers are left not knowing how Wilson really figured it out, and later in the book, they see that it was Tom who told Wilson about the owner of the car. In this scene, I liked the book version better than the edited film, because the book made the readers more attracted to the interesting part. Later in the book, when he sees Tom again on the street years after Gatsby died, Nick inquires Tom if he had told anything to Wilson that afternoon. He then thought, "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy-they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made..." For some reason, I found this quite touching, and I absolutely agreed with him.

Once scene that was missing in the film was when Gatsby met with Jordan for the last time. The book describes, "There was one thing to be done before I left, in awkward, unpleasant thing that perhaps had better have been let alone. But I wanted to leave things in order and not just trust that obliging and indifferent sea to sweep my refuse away." He gets together with Jordan Baker and talked over about what happened to them. After he had explained, she said one thing; she was engaged with another man. "Angry, and half in love with her, and tremendously sorry, I turned away." Without this scene in the movie, I felt as if the story was unconcluded. It was one of the parts which were left unresolved, along with the scene where Nick meets Tom again. Having the scenery in the book, it is clear to the audience about the relationship between Nick and Daisy.

Books and movies can give different impact depending on the author and the filmmaker. Usually, books give more details about the scenes along with significant symbolisms in depth, whereas the movie is very direct and straightforward. The book being very addicting, I enjoyed reading the book tremendously. However, the movie did help me clear things up that I couldn't quite comprehend while reading the book. I highly recommend the future viewers of the film to read the book prior to viewing the movie.