I don't think there are spoilers in this.
The Great Gatsby
Perhaps there's no better way to attack the futility of the American Dream than by embracing all of the artifice of modern times, the nostalgic croon of a Lana Del Rey or the gloriously extravagant third dimension, and deconstructing it from the inside out.
We all become Nick Carraway, a constant observer and occasional interloper.
It could be easy to lose hold of the source material when modernizing the material, but it's the film's admiration for Fitzgerald's written word that acts both as its most admirable feature (outside of DiCaprio's usual masterful turn as Gatsby and Debicki's electrifying Jordan Baker) and its greatest weakness. I am no fan of the seemingly inherent supremacy of the "show don't tell" mantra that dominates cinema conversation. But Carraway's narration browbeats themes in a way that is a byproduct of filmed adaptation.
And despite some of the film's visual charms, its clear love for the text on which it's based, and another entry in what is quickly making 2013 the year of the deadly lie that has manifest as a glorious American Dream, there's this lack of bite to most of the film. Sure there's a sense that we are always being watched, always being judged, but it feels less like it's by the bespectacled billboard's eyes of God and more properly the endlessly vapid gaze of Carey Mulligan's Daisy.