An overstuffed armchair of a movie

Rating: 6/10 (29 June 2013)

Leonardo DiCaprio and Casey Mulligan look terrific, but DiCaprio's performance is a bit puppet-like, though this may be Baz Luhrmann's direction, and Mulligan doesn't quite capture the shallow brittleness of Daisy the way Farrow did. Tobey Maguire is outstandingly good as Daisy's narrator cousin Nick, a character who may have inspired L.P Hartley to create the boy Leo in THE GO-BETWEEN.
The big fault with the movie - and it will always be there - is Scott Fitzgerald's fault: not enough happens. Will Daisy and Gatsby recapture their lost love? What's the truth about his past? These are the only two elements to the story. An already slim plot gets thinner with such an extended adaptation. And repeated overcrowded parties and long tracking shots soon begin to look like the padding is coming out of this overstuffed armchair of a movie.
It's visually glorious (and I only saw the 2D version) but it's a bit like a sweet with a hollow centre.