The Great Gatsby (2013)

rating: ***

the story: Nick Carraway becomes swept up in the epic life of Jay Gatsby.

review: Leonardo DiCaprio has frequently been a brilliant actor.  Not always.  And it's always strange to discover the exceptions.  The Great Gatsby is one of them.

Baz Luhrmann does the Moulin Rouge version of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic, and Spider-Man, I mean Tobey Maguire, is our host.  Maguire's casting, and performance, in the film is one of the textbook examples of failing to escape a well-known role.  Maguire had a career as someone other than Spider-Man, before he put on the spandex, but then he did and now, because he's an actor of limited range, it's going to be hard to see him as anything but Spider-Man.  And I find it difficult to believe that Lurhmann didn't on some level comprehend that.  Maguire has voiceover work in his Spider-Man movies, too, so it's even harder to understand.  He plays Carraway as the same Peter Parker dork persona, and Luhrmann dresses him as the same Peter Parker dork persona. 

And then in strolls DiCaprio, and by now it's clear that he's developed a worn-in face, but the voice, if he isn't careful, is that of a child actor who...just has a career that's inexplicably continued.  And that's Leo DiCaprio if he hasn't bothered to sculpt a performance.  And that's his Gatsby.  Anytime he opens his mouth, it's just Jack from Titanic in an alternate reality.  Which I suppose was half the point of casting DiCaprio in the role.

Carey Mulligan is Daisy Buchanan.  Mulligan was the It Girl at the time, but displays little reason for being It in the role.  Isla Fisher has a thankless tiny supporting role (as she tends to have), and Jason Clarke is in it, too.

The real reason, the only reason to watch this version of The Great Gatsby is Joel Edgerton's Tom Buchanan, is Joel Edgerton.  Following his Hollywood breakthrough performance in Warrior (2011), The Great Gatsby was Edgerton's first real chance to shine, and he obviously threw himself at the opportunity.  His even better performance in Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014), I suspect, has something to do with this one.  Edgerton's somewhat blank face has always been his biggest drawback, but his voice and his sheer acting talent, when he's been allowed to shine, are undeniably huge assets.  He clearly seized this opportunity.  He's the only one in the movie who simultaneously loses himself in the time period and dominates the screen every time he appears.  Some would call it overacting, or simply dismiss him as a ham.  Those I would call clueless idiots.  In another era, he would've instantly become a huge star.  In this one he's settled back into a fairly anonymous career in the years since. 

So the Jay Gatsby of this version?  Is its Tom Buchanan.