The_Great_Gatsby__a_Comparison_Between_the_Movie_and_the_Novel

The Great Gatsby: A Comparison between the Movie and the Novel The novel, The Great Gatsby, is an excellent book written by Scott Fitzgerald. It does an outstanding job at portraying the life during the Jazz Age, as well as exploring internal themes, such as love and trying to relive the past. Scott Fitzgerald lived during the Jazz Age and had a live similar life to that of characters in the novel. Therefore, he is able to give great insight and portray everything accurately. Then in 1974 a movie based on novel was created. It, however, fails to achieve and represent the themes presented by Fitzgerald correctly. The movie does a good job at depicting life in the 1920’s, because of the outstanding actors and actresses. A problem occurs in the movie with the characters. In the novel it said that all the characters were around 30 years old, but in the movie some of the characters, especially Tom, are too old for the part they played. Furthermore, in the novel Tom was described as an especially muscular man, who uses his strength to physically dominate and control others. In the movie he is barely bigger than Nick, and he does not appear to use violence to dominate others very often. In the movie Daisy loses so many of what seemed to be her key characteristics in the novel. In the novel, Daisy is nothing more than a simple airhead. She is stuck-up, incredibly selfish and extremely dumb. In the movie, on the other hand, she is a much more active character. She is able to think for herself and show true emotions. In the movie, she actually appears to love Gatsby. Whereas, in the novel she is only playing around, expecting to get everything she points at. In the book, Myrtle was supposed to be ugly, overweight and dirty. In the movie, Myrtle is nicely dressed, skinny and quite attractive. By doing this the audience losing the opportunity to see that Tom is trying to get away from the life he has, by being interested in a woman who is the exact opposite of Daisy. When Tom, Jordan and Nick are parked outside, Myrtle punches through the window. She begins to bleed profusely, yet all she does is put her hand in her mouth. This makes her appear rather insane, which there were absolutely no signs of in the novel. Necessary information about Gatsby’s part is left out of the movie. The way that Gatsby rose to success was completely left out. The movie leaves out the story about Dan Cody. Because the entire Dan Cody part was not mentioned, we never really see that Gatsby was once a lower-class working man. Another part of Gatsby’s life was totally different in the movie. The book had Gatsby actually tell Nick that his real name was James Gats. In the book, Nick goes to Gatsby’s party and accidently bumps into him there. In the movie Gatsby had one of his servants summon Nick to his room. This formal way that they met seems very awkward and pointless. This meeting did not last very long and Nick never mentioned that he was in the war. Nick knew who Gatsby was right from the start, which kept the dialogue short and barely anything was learned about the two men. The worst thing about the movie was that it lacked the deeper meaning. The themes are not presented clearly. Important themes, such the difficulty with confronting the truth or the disillusion of time, were only visible if one had read the book. In the book, Nick is the narrator; he follows Gatsby and Daisy, telling the story from his point of view. Nick sees things and makes sense of things for the reader. The movie does not create this narrator character, and therefore many of the themes Fitzgerald wished to show are very unclear. The movie was far from an accurate portrayal of the book. Many important themes were unclear or completely left out. The movie left the viewer with so many unanswered questions. The book, on the other hand, answers basically all questions and the ending is well put together. The movie was nothing compared to the book