More Beats and Booms than the Book

Rating: 9/10 (17 August 2013)

9.1 of 10 for a book I would rate 8.25 of 10. While I can understand some people complaining about the rap/hip-hop use (which could have been integrated better, but really does fit the film and the situations after the first surprise), there's certain things about the city and early suburban settings that this film captures that the book failed to. It does so without losing the core of the story, enhancing it in some ways.
The ending is so impressive that I walked out ready to give the film a 10. But, as mentioned, there are little annoyances that could have been easily avoided or done better. None of it involves the acting, although DeCaprio is not the ideal casting choice for the character he plays. The story, dress, and realism of the settings all help to overcome most of the problems.
In addition to capturing the inherent disparities of pre-Depression, prohibition-era America, this also captures the big city industrialization better than most of the films and science fiction dedicated specifically to recreate and extrapolate massive cities. It's worth seeing as is, regardless of the book.