Book Vs Movie The Great Gatsby

For any book lover, when the movie comes out expectations are already low because it is extremely hard for a director to capture the same experience as written in the book in a much shorter time. There is no exception when discussing the movie “The Great Gatsby”, directed by Baz Luhrmann in 2013. Cinematical decisions concerning the characters, plot, and scenes changed the original vision that author F. Scott Fitzgerald dreamed for his book when it was published in 1925. By specifically analyzing three scenes from the movie and comparing them to the book, it is very clear to see that the movie is not an accurate representation of the classic novel.

The movie opens in a snowy, cold New York City and within the first minutes Nick Carraway is

Fitzgerald decided to push this idea and make his audience think about the messages he was conveying, while Luhrmann wanted his film to have mass appeal so he chose to rewrite the ending of Gatsby's life. Gatsby is shot by a grieving George Wilson while taking a swim. Although in the movie, Gatsby is getting out of his pool to answer the ringing phone, which he believes to be Daisy calling. In the book, Gatsby has his butler waiting on a phone that never rings. In contrast, when Gatsby is shot in the movie he gets to die in peace believing Daisy is calling to tell him she wants to be together. In reality Nick is on the other end of the line and hears the gunshot, so the audience knows the truth but Gatsby dies thinking what he has hoped for his entire life. In the book Nick talks about how Gatsby must’ve felt knowing that he had failed his dream, “I have an idea that Gatsby himself didn’t believe it would come, and perhaps he no longer cared. If that was true he must have felt that he had lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream. He must have looked up at an unfamiliar sky through frightening leaves and shivered as he found what a grotesque thing a rose is and how raw the sunlight was upon the

Scott Fitzgerald. Unreliable circumstances molds an untrustworthy and dishonest narrator, a variation from the book to the movie to create a more dramatic scene, changes how the audience feels about Daisy and Gatsby’s relationship. A small rewrite by director Baz Luhrmann creates a happy ending that was never originally envisioned affects the mood of the audiences. By comparing and contrasting three very important scenes to the development of the plot, it is clear to see how the changes made by director Baz Luhrmann did not give the outstanding representation that The Great Gatsby