Thursday, April 04, 2013
The Great Gatsby soundtrack roster is packed: In addition to the previously-mentioned Beyoncé and André 3000 cover of Amy Winehouse's "Back to Black", the Jay-Z-orchestrated tracklist includes new, original songs by Jay himself, the xx, and Florence and the Machine. There's also the Jack White cover of U2's "Love Is Blindness" (previously featured in the movie's first trailer), and a Bryan Ferry cover of Beyoncé's "Crazy in Love".You know what? That might work. It is bound to work better than a soundtrack full of 1920's white person jazz. With all due respect (a phrase that always means, "Duck!") 1920's popular music was -- evolving. Quite a bit of it was excellent, particularly when Duke Ellington was involved, but unless one is a student of it the "jazz" in The Jazz Age is a bit of an acquired taste. Gatsby shouldn't be a languorous experience: it is a surprisingly fast-paced tale full of colorful characters that takes place over a short, party filled summer. Say what you will about the musicians listed above, all of them would appreciate Nick Carraway's sense of style. The problem with Jack Clayton's 1974 run at Gatsby, filmed through gauze and starring mannequins made up to look like Robert Redford and Mia Farrow was that Clayton was trying to re-create the novel, instead of trying to tell the story. It didn't help that he really didn't seem to understand the story, but the end result amounted to a sort of fashion show with no real plot or character development at all. This Gatsby deserves credit out of the box for taking on a difficult work, and although it may well be dreadful, and although there is a good likelihood that it will bomb, I'm prepared to give it a chance.
// posted by Bill @ 11:11 AM 
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I am a story person. The first time I read Gatsby, I was not much impressed. That's because I think I was too young AND I didn't like the characters in the story. Recently, I re-read it and loved it. Maybe I've slowed down and lived more.. Now I loved the way Fitzgerald made the story flow. I got floated along on his stream of words.
I have not seen either Gatsby movie but can't imagine that it would be easy to capture all that is wonderful about that book. I would think it almost impossible for an actor to capture all that is in each character and all the sadness that was in their lives.
As to what music should help make the movie, I have no clue. I'm sure I would find the music of the '20s annoying. I never liked it. I'm usually not aware of background music in films except when it is annoying and then it can ruin a good movie..
I have not seen either Gatsby movie but can't imagine that it would be easy to capture all that is wonderful about that book. I would think it almost impossible for an actor to capture all that is in each character and all the sadness that was in their lives.
As to what music should help make the movie, I have no clue. I'm sure I would find the music of the '20s annoying. I never liked it. I'm usually not aware of background music in films except when it is annoying and then it can ruin a good movie..
Well, as to the music, the point should be that it sounds like exciting, party music to the audience. A Jazz Age soundtrack would not do that, even for me, even though I like that music.
What's wonderful about the book is entirely the wrong thing for any moviemaker to focus on. Stories can be told any number of ways, and the way that a story is told has to make sense. Merely shoehorning a narrative into a different format seldom ends well. You tell a story as a novel because you want to use language to describe things. You tell a story as a poem because you want to compress your meaning, or because you want to make it easier to memorize and be passed down. You tell a story as a movie because the tools movies make available are unique: it is not merely a visual medium, it is a visual medium that allows you to use close-ups to convey emotions, and light to express sensation, and all of the rest of it. Most of the time we don't even notice it, but good movies do a lot of things that no other medium permit.
What's wonderful about the book is entirely the wrong thing for any moviemaker to focus on. Stories can be told any number of ways, and the way that a story is told has to make sense. Merely shoehorning a narrative into a different format seldom ends well. You tell a story as a novel because you want to use language to describe things. You tell a story as a poem because you want to compress your meaning, or because you want to make it easier to memorize and be passed down. You tell a story as a movie because the tools movies make available are unique: it is not merely a visual medium, it is a visual medium that allows you to use close-ups to convey emotions, and light to express sensation, and all of the rest of it. Most of the time we don't even notice it, but good movies do a lot of things that no other medium permit.
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