The Great Gatsby (A)

Baz Luhrman does the near-impossible task of taking a tragedy for the modern age and elevating it into a big-budget, continuously engrossing spectacle that retains all of its source material’s depth and craftsmanship.

Nick Carraway, the protagonist of both the film and the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic novel it is based on, is a young, working class man who gets a small cottage in 1920s Long Island and begins a friendship with the J. Gatsby, the young, mysterious, fantastically wealthy man who lives next door. Carroway soon learns that Gatsby is guarding some pretty critical secrets, and tied up in them is Daisy Buchanan, the woman he loves who is married to one of the state’s most powerful men.
Tobey MaGuire is a perfect fit as Carroway, bringing a sweet sincerity to the role. Carey Mulligan is always fantastic, and as Daisy she is no exception, playing her as both endearingly attractive and infuriatingly petulant--we (the audience) completely see why Gatsby loves her, but we also see why she is a selfish child. The focus of the story is Gatsby, and it is a role Leonardo DiCaprio was born to play. Taking the dreamy charm he displayed in Titanic and the intense ferocity he showcased in The Departed (with a dash of the charisma he employed in last-year’s Django Unchained), he makes a Gatsby that it is impossible not to find utterly riveting, as he is both larger than life and painfully human.

Though opening in spring has brought The Great Gatsby one of the biggest opening weekends of the year (making about as much as GI: Joe Retaliation made in four days and Oblivion did in a week), it is a pity that it didn’t open during awards season as this is one of those movies that would sweep the technical categories. It is quite possible that out of all living directors, Baz Luhrman (Romeo + Juliet, the Nicole Kidman Moulin Rouge film) is the one who knows best how to create breathtaking images. With his life-time collaborator (and wife) Catherine Martin at production design, the set pieces are flawless: I think it surpasses anything I saw in all of last year. Cinematographer Simon Duggan--probably best known for creating that sleek, modern, and vaguely foreboding look of I, Robot that dozens of note-worthy directors have spent years trying to emulate--reaches new heights on this picture; it is impossible to look away from anything on the screen. And, of course, the costumes (also from Martin) are amazing.

What is particularly great about it, though, is that at no point does it feel like this imagery is merely there; it is always used to further the story. This is a movie that would only work if everything is surreally gorgeous, but Luhrman knows to make it all have an empty, soulless quality. That is an enormous risk to take, but it is one that pays off fantastically. With the 3-D (the format this picture should be viewed in) and intricately detailed visual effects (seriously, the CGI is on par with anything you will see in this summer’s super-hero adventures) it is an utterly enchanting, absorbing world; however, the constantly moving camera (done with a giant crane that gave Luhrman a concussion), the lightning-fast cuts (worthy of an Best Editing nomination), and pounding score (which is somehow modern without being glaringly anachronistic) makes none of it satisfying. It looks like you are watching a hallucination, or perhaps looking into a perpetually rotating china doll house. It is all perfect, it is all realistic, but it isn’t real. And Luhrman absolutely intended it to be that way.

Because in the end, this is a story about a good person who is completely captivated by an impossible dream based entirely around an illusion, surrounded by priceless treasures but utterly miserable, living a life with no true meaning.
Luhrman’s fantastic vision brings this unconventional story to life not as a stuffy indie film but in the massive spectacle that Fitzgerald intended--and Gatsby deserved.

Evil Dead (A-)

Director Fede Alvarez smashes onto the scene with a wildly entertaining picture that has pretty much everything you would want from a modern day horror film. He knows when the picture should be scary, when it should be funny, and--most importantly--he knows the importance of telling an actual story.
David, Eric, Mia, Olivia, and Natalie (their names are an acronym for “DEMON”) are five people in their mid-20s who decide to spend a weekend in a cabin deep in the woods so Mia has a quiet place to kick her drug addiction. Unfortunately, someone foolishly reads the text from an occult book and ends up summoning the Abomination, a fearsome demon that inhabits people’s bodies and causes them to do horrifically violent acts to themselves and others.

This isn’t a remake of the 1981 horror/comedy classic The Evil Dead; it is more of a reboot. It manages to retain the best elements of the original and please fans without being a retread. In fact, it was produced by Sam Raimi, the man behind the first three pictures (and the Tobey Maguire Spider-man films, because apparently one excellent trilogy that reinvented a genre wasn’t enough for him).
Horror movies aren’t exactly renowned for showcasing the finest acting talents, so it is a big surprise that the actors in this movie are very good. Lou Taylor Pucci as the nerdy high-school teacher Eric is particularly note-worthy and Jane Levy (star of TV’s Suburgatory) brings heart, depth, and true terror to the role of Mia. The job of the demonic doppelganger for her goes to Randal Wilson, who so convincing that his IMDB page lists him as an “Actress” despite the fact that he is male.

The most impressive work, though, comes from behind the camera with Fede Alvarez. Despite this being his directorial debut, he showcases artistic finesse that puts him on par with even the most renowned horror icons, albeit in his own unique style. Alvarez has a very fast pace for his movie and cuts from shot to shot swiftly and with confidence. This is not a Paranormal Activity-style tale where the scares are built very slowly and come in the form of quick moments; Evil Dead, like the original, starts out strong and terrifies by building a steady sense of relentless fear, one where viewers don’t even have enough time to think or rationalize it. Some would say that his pension for using absurd amounts of gore and how most of his scenes revolve around self-mutilation is a cheap trick: I would argue that it is no more cheap than using jump scares. Insidious is only scary because they suddenly pound a piano chord really hard and have something fly at the camera to make you startled.

About that gore: There is a lot of it. A lot. And, as said above, it mostly revolves around self-mutilation. The (in)famous tree rape scene is significantly toned down from the 1981 picture, but the blood and dismemberment that was rendered a little goofily in the very low-budget original is brought with stunning realism through a fantastic mixture of practical and digital effects.
Of course, really bloody violence gets silly after a while, and Alvarez knows when to switch from scary to funny. The best scares come fairly early on during a scene taking place in a marshy forest during pouring rain (and daylight, oddly); by the end, the film is all-out action-comedy. What is surprising, though, is how well it works--the transition doesn’t ever seem forced. This is mostly due to the very solid story Alvarez crafts.

Early drafts of the film (written by Alvarez) apparently showcase a more typical horror flick which adopts the Wan-ian style where story is secondary to scares. However, after rewrites (including an uncredited one from Diablo Cody) as well as the influence of the producers, like Raimi, the final picture is an engrossing study on addiction, family, and perseverance. It might not have the depth of Lincoln, but it is still a very good tale with actual morals where the scares advance its plot and themes rather than interrupt it.
Perfectly blending comedy, action, and horror, Fede Alvarez has made a new fantastic horror classic that uses story-telling rather than jump scares to constantly surprise and entertain.