2. The Score
While the soundtrack - or more specifically, some of the more overt musical decisions made by musical consultant Jay-Z - have their problems (more of which later,) the score is an absolute triumph. As with all of Luhrmann's previous works, The Great Gatsby makes as many bold musical statements as it does visual ones, and the presence of music as character is hard to ignore (you suspect that Luhrmann would find the very suggestion abhorrent.) But somewhat ironically for a director so invested in those bold statements, it is the smaller scale moments in the musical accompaniment to the film that are the most important and the most successful. Strings swell in all the right places, and it is the more artistic, and more nuanced accompaniments that really make the difference, and not those that are insistent and invasive. The film's central love story might be rather unevenly focused upon, in detriment to other emotional aspects of the story, but when Luhrmann is able to present those tender moments with such impact (as he always has) the reasons become abundantly clear. We might not wholly believe in Carey Mulligan's performance (she is reduced to a doe-eyed wallflower at times,) but in the scenes she shares with DiCaprio, she rises above the rest of her performance, and the authenticity of that relationship is helped both by infectious chemistry, but also the smart way the dynamic is framed, visually and musically.