What's with the excessive use of green screen old sport

Rating: 3/10 (30 July 2013)

First things first, I have to start off by saying I'm not a fan of The Great Gatsby book. In actual fact it is the worst book I have ever read. The characters, with the exception of Tom, are bland and boring and the story is uninspired and predictable. I'm also not a fan of the 1974 Robert Redford version of the story. While I can say Luhrmann's attempt is better than the Redford version, it still by no means makes it a good film. However, that said I did go into The Great Gatsby with an open mind, and I don't think it helped one bit.
I'll get the good things out of the way first. The soundtrack is good for the most part with songs by Jay-Z, Goyte and Nero. The best song however was an already existing song by Flux Pavilion called I Can't Stop. Shame the scene it was used in is the most headache inducing scene in the entire film. Joel Edgerton's performance as Tom and Jason Clarke as George are good, however these are the only good performances in the film. Finally, the way Luhrmann decided to tell the story by sending Nick to a doctor/psychiatrist about his experiences with Gatsby I thought, at first, was quite clever. However, in classic Luhrmann fashion, he finds a way to ruin one of the few things he has going for the film by getting Nick to write The Great Gatsby book. And it's all downhill from there.
The Great Gatsby has it's fair share of major problems. Possibly the most glaring problem of The Great Gatsby is the over use of green screen. This wouldn't bother me if the green screen was used in moderation or if it was used stylistically like in 300 or Sin City. While you could argue that Luhrmann uses it stylistically in some scenes, but when it is used for the backdrop for the scenes set at George's garage is down right unacceptable. What makes this worse is that all the jewels in the movie are 100% real and cost million upon million of dollars/pounds. Another glaring flaw of the movie is the iffy acting. DiCaprio as the illusive Gatsby isn't horrible and if he improved his accent, his performance might be passable. However, with the accent he went with does nothing but stain his performance. Also this might be just me but I thought DiCaprio would have been a better Nick than he was a Gatsby. Mulligan is even worse, there is nothing redeemable about her whining performance as Daisy. This just isn't acceptable as Mulligan is a great actress. Don't believe, just watch Drive. The person who play Jordan, Elizabeth Debick, wasn't good either and if she does have acting talent, you wouldn't know it from watching this train wreck. But the worst offender bar non is Maguire, but then again, that isn't a surprised as he wasn't that good in the Spider-man films either.
Overall, The Great Gatsby is the worst movie I have seen at the cinemas this year. The over use of green screen, the iffy acting and the stupid choices made by Luhrmann. I might be able to recommend this to fans of the book, but to fans of good movies, I would look elsewhere, preferably not another Baz Luhrmann film though.