Essay On The Differences Between The Great Gatsby Book And Movie

The Great Gatsby: Differences in the Film and Novel There are a few differences between The Great Gatsby novel and film. The scenes that are different do not necessarily change the overall plot of the film, but they do modify the meaning and tone of that specific act. However, even with the differences the film stays true to the novel for the most part. Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby stays fairly faithful to the novel, but there a few scenes in the movie that have been changed from the book.
The first difference is where Nick Carraway, the main protagonist of the story, narrates from. At the beginning of the movie Nick is checked in at a sanitarium for his “alcoholism”. A doctor in the sanitorium asks him questions about his time in New York and Nick responds with how he arrived there. Later into the movie the doctor requests that he write his experience in New York down on a typewriter and eventually, he does. From that point on glimpses of words from the novel and Nick writing the story in the sanitarium are shown. At the end of the film the doctor walks into Nick’s chamber while he is asleep and picks up papers that are scattered throughout the room that would eventually become The Great Gatsby.
In the novel, it does not mention where, why, and when Nick wrote this book. This conflicts with the novel because the film gives the reason why
Claudia Puig in her article “‘Great Gatsby’ is empty underneath its shiny surface” states the funeral scene in the novel is an emotional moment but the film just glances over it. Also, the film also harsh when presenting how lonely Gatsby was after his death (Haglund). Gatsby’s father and the man Nick met in Gatsby’s library at his first party attend the funeral in the book, but in the film they are absent. The film had a great chance to recreate a powerful moment from the novel but, it did not capitalize on the