Oscar Outlook 2012: The Great Gatsby

LD: I need my mojo back
CM: This will not be the film
to give it to you, Leo

I'm not a big Baz Luhrmann film.  I fell for his tricks once, back when Moulin Rouge! came out.  I left the movie theater feeling like I would fall in love any day now.  And I don't discount the way he was able to stir up my heart.  But, the film itself did not age so well and I got over it pretty fast (sorry Nathaniel).  He has few films credits to his name, but Rouge! was the closet I ever got to liking him.  Now, he's taken on The Great Gatsby, the film Bradley Cooper publicly begged to have a role in.  Cooper needs a new management team, because his professional conduct and personal life don't befit a man who is cultivating a trip up to the Oscar podium.  But, then, he hasn't exactly shown himself to have much talent on his side, either?  I'm sorry, I was talking about Luhrmann's new film about rich people shtupping each other ...

Hi Sexy Felix

Luhrmann and Craig Pearce adapted F. Scott Fitzgerald's famous novel.  Pearce has worked on most of Luhrmann's feature films, as well as Charlie St. Cloud.  Adapting Gatsby sounds as thrilling as trying to read it, but I can't imagine with Luhrmann behind the camera, he's going to find all kinds of camera spinning to beef up "the Jazz Age."  Leonardo Dicaprio sounds almost as boring of a choice as Robert Redford.  Also in the cast: Carey Mulligan, Isla Fisher, Joel Edgerton and the über-boring Tobey Maguire.  Also in the cast in a nominal role is this guy Felix Williamson, a stone-cold fox.  Stephen James King is pretty easy on the eyes too.

You're not so bad yourself, 
Mr. King

Producers include: Barrie M. Osborne (LOTR, The Matrix), Lucy Fisher and Douglas Wick (Lawless, Memoirs of a Geisha, Nailed), Catherine Knapman (Luhrmann's last three films), Anton Monsted (also music supervisor), Luhrmann and his wife Catherine Martin.  Film Editing was done by Jason Ballantine, Jonathan Redmond and Matt Villa.  Three!?  I guess with all that footage and cutting, three would be a minimum for a Luhrmann production.  (Although one more than Australia.)  All of them worked to some capacity on Rouge!

Once upon a time, Mia Farrow
and the upcoming Great Gatsby
movie were a big deal

Luhrmann has never worked with cinematographer Simon Duggan before, which is the good news.  The bad news are his list of credits: I, Robot; Killer Elite, Knowing and sequels to Die Hard and B-film franchises like Underworld and The Mummy.  Everyone has to start somewhere, right?  And, I shouldn't judge films I've intentionally steered clear of.  Wife Martin has not only worked as production designer on all five of his films (having gotten nominated twice in this category), but she designed the costumes for his last three films (again, getting nominated twice in this category) and coproduced all but one of his films.  Composer Craig Armstrong has worked on Rouge!, Ray, and other former Oscar-bait films.  Worst case scenario: Carey Mulligan and Catherine Martin (for Art Direction and Costume Design: mensch!) will surely get nods.

This is the cover from the
edition I read (jazz) ages ago

The budget is reported to be $127M.  Who okayed this?  I guess this one's going to be in the name of "art" just like Australia was.  Gatsby filmed the last four months of 2011 in New South Wales, Australia and will release on Christmas Day 2012 care of Warner Bros. Pictures.

Aren't you Excited?

Also on the Radar:

Anna Karenina     Argo     Beasts of the Southern Wild     The Bourne Legacy     The Dark Knight Rises     Dark Shadows     Django Unchained     Gangster Squad     Great Expectations     The Great Gatsby     The Hobbit     Hope Springs     The Hunger Games     Hyde Park on the Hudson     Lawless     Lincoln     Lola Versus     Lovelace     Low Life     Magic Mike     The Master     Les Misérables     Life of Pi     Moonrise Kingdom     People Like Us     Prometheus     To Rome with Love     Ruby Sparks     Savages     Seeking a Friend for the End of the World     The Silver Linings Playbook     Smashed     The Surrogate     Trouble with the Curve     Won't Back Down 


The Avengers     The Amazing Spider-Man     Men in Black III