It's truly stunning that with the talent and budget this production team had at their disposal they couldn't have delivered a better film.

There's not a shred of artistic merit to be found in this movie. They've taken one of the greatest novels ever written and literally turned it into a nightclub inspired nightmare. It's plays out as if a drug fueled twenty two year old with an affinity for early 2000s rap and absolutely zero culture or understanding of the source material was handed an Oscar winning script and a blank check and then proceeded to completely deconstruct it in the worst possible ways. A complete and total waste of talent and money if I've ever seen one.

Why are there no less than a dozen Kanye West and Jay Z remixes littered throughout a depression era period piece about the oppressively chasmic gap between the haves and have-nots that still haunt American to this day? How did they manage to make this story so overtly racist from the very start with their constant exploitation of modern afro American culture when the original intention of the novel was to layer in the not so subtle disdain of African Americans as well as the have nothing whites who were all desperately attempting to climb the ladder built by the elites of New York and Chicago in the first place? It's the most ridiculous and racially inept movie I've ever seen in my life and the author would be sickened by this abominable misrepresentation of his work. The focus should have been on doing the source material absolute justice, but instead it plays like a misguided hit piece on F. Scott Fitzgerald himself.

The cast is so stacked it's crazy but half the time it feels like they were instructed to play the scene out in a way that makes no sense whatsoever and that feeling is palpable in the final product. Toby McGuire is more than just an aloof newcomer; he looks totally confused as to his motivation the majority of the time when he's typically a strong lead. Leonardo DiCaprio certainly gives less than his usually stellar best for this film and I can't help but wonder if there's a reason for all of that. Perhaps the chemistry on set was askew from the outset or maybe it was just a failure on the directors part to step up to the plate with so many talented gunslingers at their disposal. Either way the uncompelled final product is shallow and cheap throughout the entire film. The only person giving their all is Joel Edgerton, even though he's tasked with playing arguably the most vile character in the entire story, but even that begins to fade as the film wanes on.

If you've ever seen the 1974 version of this story featuring Robert Redford, which was arguably the greatest adaptation to date, then you'll have a very hard time making it even ten minutes into this movie. Even though the film is highly dated at this point they were at least able to capture the essence of the novel without cheap thrills and ridiculously out of place music. At least they were able to capitalize on the talent they had at their disposal of which this modern version had more of in droves to work with.

Save yourself a couple of hours and skip this one because it's uninspired garbage from start to finish. "The Great Waste" would have been a better title.