MOVIE PREVIEW: Fitzgerald’s words shimmer and shine in “The Great Gatsby” movie

See here, old sport!

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s timeless words come shimmering to life in Baz Luhrmann’s production of “The Great Gatsby.”

Those who read and loved the book will enjoy the movie even more, with the dialogue and narrative straight off the pages. The story follows Midwesterner Nick Carraway (played perfectly by the unassuming Tobey Maguire) who moves to New York in 1922, giving up his dreams of becoming a writer to be a bond salesman.

It has been said that Carraway is really a reflection of Fitzgerald and Luhrmann’s interpretation makes this crystal clear. The only time the movie sways away from the novel is at the beginning and end, where Carraway is in a mental institution, telling a doctor about his experiences that summer.  While we won’t give away the ending, the similarities between Carraway and Fitzgerald get nicely tied up, with a cherry on top.

Carraway lives in West Egg, Long Island. His cousin, the beautiful and breezy Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan nails it!) and her uptight, blue-blooded husband, Tom Buchanan (a Joel Edgerton that you love to hate) live across the bay in old-money East Egg.

Carraway’s mysterious neighbor is Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio also nails it, old sport), who throws weekly lavish parties that are fantastically depicted in the film. What we soon find out is that Gatsby is throwing the parties solely to see if his one-time lost love, Daisy, will show up.

The supporting characters are also wonderfully cast. Elizabeth Debicki makes her film debut as aloof golfer Jordan Baker, Isla Fischer plays the fiery Myrtle Wilson, Jason Clarke is the desperate George Wilson and Indian film star Amitabh Bachchan plays Meyer Wolfsheim, one of Gatsby’s “business connections.”

Although the film is two and a half hours, you barely notice it. Each scene is rich with color and scenery – made even more lifelike by the magic of 3D – and the dialogue is right out of the book, which will satisfy fans of the original novel. Luhrmann did not leave out any details.

When we first meet Jordan Baker, she and Daisy are lounging on white couches, and she is reading a copy of the Town Tattle, just like Fitzgerald imagined. Gatsby really does have a machine that juices hundreds of oranges at once and a character named Klipspringer plays the Wurlitzer organ.

The scene where Gatsby throws all his shirts at Daisy is particularly perfect. It captures all of the raw emotion of their love story. Carraway’s narration also weaves in and out of the movie, seamlessly, with Fitzgerald’s words often appearing on the screen.

One thing we were not fond of was the soundtrack. Hearing Jay-Z’s song “$100 Bill” juxtaposed over flappers and roaring 20s revelry was strange, to say the least. We wished someone would have found tunes specifically mentioned in the story, like the waltz “Three O’Clock in the Morning,” that is noted during one of Gatsby’s lavish parties.

“The Great Gatsby” is something that everyone who loved the book should see.  Fitzgerald would be proud.