Comic Book Fitzgerald

Rating: 2/10 (25 August 2013)

If you think Fitzgerald should resemble a combination of Sin City and Transformers, then this movie is for you. If you adore the two second, quick cut style of the typical MTV video and can endure two hours and twenty minutes of it, then this movie is for you. If you value style well above substance, and are the type prone to donning sunglasses at night believing it lends gravitas to your mien, then this move is for you. If you think the Jazz Era mood can be cleverly recreated using Hip Hop and Beyoncé, then this move is for you. If you still play Star Wars with your buddies and savor getting punch-drunk after being hit a thousand times with a flashing green light saber, then this movie is for you. If you are nostalgic about the days when the needle of your phonograph got stuck on a scratch of a 78 rpm vinyl disc, then this movie is for you, Old Sport, Old Sport. If you believe Toby Maguire deserves to be in the top tax bracket and walk, rather than sweep, the Red Carpet come Oscar time, then this movie is for you. If you can believe Daisy, as portrayed by Carey Mulligan, is sufficiently inspiring to drive a man to move Heaven and Earth, and Hell to boot, to become rich beyond measure, then this movie is....no....then you'll never be rich.
Nearly everything about this garish abomination irritated me. I happen to love the 1932 Duesenberg SJ, even in yellow, but I cannot figure how Gatsby got the Beta version in 1922. I can only conclude he was driving with a Poetic License.
If anything can be salvaged from this affront to the Estate of F. Scott, other than the fact that it might violate some obscure provision of the Patriot Act and land Baz Luhrmann a stint at Guantanamo sharing Director's cuts with Khalid Sheik Mohammed, it is that it might serve admirably as a job application to become Justin Bieber's video director.