The Great Gatsby

The 2013 film portrayal of The Great Gatsby wasn’t the first of its kind, but it starred Leonardo DiCaprio (Titanic, Inception), so it’s really the only one that matters. Leo plays the sophisticated Jay Gatsby himself, accompanied by Tobey Maguire (Spider-Man) as Nick Carraway and Carey Mulligan (Pride & Prejudice) as Daisy Buchanan. While DiCaprio certainly exuded the charm and laid-back sophistication that audiences expected from Gatsby, the role didn’t win him a coveted Oscar. In fact, it won him very little at all.
The film received a variety of awards, including two Academy Awards, 12 AACTA Awards, one British Academy Film Award, and two Critics’ Choice Movie Awards. It was also nominated for three Grammy Awards. However, most of the awards focused on the film’s costume and production design rather than the acting. Critics gave mixed reviews of the film, stating that while the visuals were impressive, they overshadowed a delicate plot with their garish representation of the Roaring Twenties.
The movie never strayed too far from the original Great Gatsby plot, but the minor tweaks may have been enough to make critics bitter. For example, Nick Carraway is shown writing The Great Gatsby in a sanitarium, which he has checked himself into after Gatsby’s death, having become a “morbid alcoholic.” This isn’t part of the book, and while many movies add narrators to help audiences follow the plot, some critics felt that the addition of the sanitarium weakened Maguire’s character. The movie also glossed over the romance between Nick and Daisy’s friend Jordan Baker, including her but not the sparks.