Gatsby, Florence and the XX

I just realized, I have so much to talk about The Great Gatsby. Some argue that the recent film adaptation is sort of porn for all the Gatsby's fans. Yes I have to admit that the movie can be over-hyped in some way. Personally, I think the movie isn't that good. It is good but I just feel it lacks of something. Watching the movie after reading the book, now I can finally understand why readers always say, book is better than the movie, especially it is a book you love. 

So over-anticipation is really a thing. Whenever the characters say the famous lines, such as Daisy's "I hope she'll be a fool..." and Gatsby's "Can't repeat the past, why of course you can!" etc., it's just doesn't feel right. It is just like the characters are quoting a book and not truly come from themselves. I mean I really don't mind spoilers or whatever, but it just doesn't feel right. 

I guess those famous lines are so powerful that they feel alive to me, and nobody can say them as if they own them anymore. They should nowhere be found but to exist solely in the book. Throughout the movie, I had this excitement, expecting when the next famous line would come, and when the moment hit, it just bummed me out. So, my feeling about the movie kept fluctuating, up and down. And I was a bit frustrated.  

Anyway, one undeniable positive side of the movie is its soundtrack. It is just perfect for the story. Recently I keep playing and replaying the soundtrack, again and again. I mean there are Lana, Gotye, The XX, Beyoncé, Fergie and Florence, plus Kanye West's No Church In The Wild! All the songs are very powerful, and I love them all. For the first time, I have to say, thank you, Jay Z and the Bullitts, and also the director Baz Luhrmann, for creating such a good film score in a whole.  

All the songs are good. But if to pick only one song among all, I would pick Florence + The Machine's Over The Love. And I just found out a mind-blowing fact recently. The song is based on an unsignificant paragraph in the book,

"One of the girls in yellow was playing the piano, and beside her stood a tall, red haired young lady from a famous chorus, engaged in song. She had drunk a quantity of champagne, and during the course of her song she had decided, ineptly, that everything was very, very sad - she was not only singing, she was weeping too. Whenever there was a pause in the song she filled it with gasping, broken sobs, and then took up the lyrics again in a quivering soprano..."

Mind-blown indeed.

There is also the song titled Together by The XX. The XX is an English band I discovered recently, and immediately fell in love to. They actually have a song named The Intro which is featured in the movie Project X. Their songs are often too short, I would say, which make you unsatisfied and you want more, so you click the replay button again and again. I am not sure whether the shortness is intentional, but one doesn't simply listen to their songs without replaying. 

So in the end, my opinion about the movie is : for those who had read the book, don't go for the movie, just re-read the book again while listening to the soundtrack of the movie; for those who haven't, the movie is not bad at all. But I guess I am in no position to talk about the movie from the point of view of someone who haven't read the book, for I am officially a Gatsby's fan. A fan of the book, not the movie.