Great Gatsby

"Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter — tomorrow we will run faster, stretching out our arms farther…… so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." The last paragraph in the book and the last line in the movie. To some it can mean so much and to others could mean so little. It represents how Gatsby believed in something. Something that others would give up on. And it was the same in both the book and the movie.

The first thing that I noticed was different in the move was that it started in a therapists office. This set the tone for how they would tell the story as the book told it. It was an addition that was needed to set up the story. The idea that the whole book was written by someone as a release in therapy was a different and innovative view on how to set up the story. Other directors might have just started with a narrator saying the lines. Baz Luhrmann thought outside of the box and made an intro that pulled me in.

The second thing that I noticed was different was how Gatsby stood on the dock when reaching for the green light instead of standing on the lawn. It wasn't something that impacted the movie but I think that, sense they were following the book they could have taken the time to make that one little thing to the book. On the other hand, being on the dock and reaching for the light at the end of Daisy's dock could be seen as him being "closer" to Daisy because the dock goes out into the water.

The third difference I saw was how Nick met Gatsby at the first party. In the movie, after looking for Gatsby for some time, he is approached by Gatsby himself. In the book, Gatsby joined a conversation thinking that they knew who he was and was surprised to find out that they didn't. I don't think that this was a change that meant something important or significant in the movie.

The movie, overall, was great...