When I look at how the novel, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott
Fitzgerald, and the movie, The Great Gatsby (2013), compare to one another,
there are many similarities. When I first went to see the movie, I was
expecting them to keep the main plot of the story the same but change some of
the smaller details and they didn’t do that at all. Most points of the story they hit on very
well and the amount of things that weren’t comparable were very small. Many of the characters in the movie matched
up very well, the plot was spot on, and the tone/mood of it was exactly how I
pictured it as I was reading the Novel.
The characters of the movies compared very well, especially
through Tom, Daisy, Jordan, and Gatsby.
When I thought of Tom throughout the story, I thought of a tough, strong
man who didn’t really have regard for anyone else in the world. The way he treats Daisy as an object is very
true in both the novel and the movie. In
the movie the way he shows aggression towards Daisy at some points but also
gives flashes of caring is how I pictured him throughout reading the
story. Daisy came off during the novel
as a smart girl that doesn’t have a care in the world until Gatsby comes
along. She has this very fake ditsy side
of her that showed during both the story and during the movie. When Gatsby comes into play though, her
emotions come out and she shows her true side that she could be a very caring
and wonderful wife. Jordan shows her
very tough, almost manly side throughout both the story and the novel. In my personal opinion, I think Jordan is
portrayed better than any other character in the story and there is not one
thing I can point out that I’d say they got wrong. Gatsby showed his gentlemen side in both
versions of the story and he was the very essence of class throughout. The whole time reading the story, I pictured
Jay Gatsby the way he was seen in the movie.
He was what you’d expect of someone of his nature.
There are not many things within the plot that were
different. The main difference I saw in
the movie was that they never showed Tom and Daisy’s kid until the very last
scene of the film; where in the book you see her much earlier in the story and
Gatsby actually gets to meet her. They
did get all of the major scenes into the movie though such as Gatsby’s parties,
the meeting between Gatsby and Daisy at Nick’s house, the hotel scene between
Tom and Gatsby, Myrtle getting hit by the car, and Gatsby’s death.
When I was reading the book, I put in kind of a modern feel
probably from habit. Growing up in the
2000s, I have never experienced what it was like in the 1920s. So when I read the story, I automatically
thought of it like it was occurring now.
In the movie they use a lot of modern music to give it that modern feel
that their main audience probably was looking for in the movie. In my personal opinion I thought the music
selection was great and it really put a modern touch on a story from almost 100
years ago. Even with this though, the
visual aspect of the movie was still able to keep around some of that roaring
20s feel and the way it mixed with the modern music gave it a really unique
feel that most movies aren’t able to achieve.
