10 “Unnecessary” Movies That Turned Out To Be Indispensable

8) The Great Gatsby

Arguing the necessity of a new film version of The Great Gatsby baffles me, since the fact that there had not been a particularly satisfactory adaptation of the novel would seem to make it more necessary, for those to whom the term has such meaning. Between complaints that a specific adaptation is unnecessary and complaints that a work is unadaptable to film, it’s a wonder that any movies actually get made.

Perhaps what gets people’s ire up over adaptations like Gatsby or Man of Steel is the fear that one particular work, one they don’t find compelling or authoritative, becomes the defining piece of work for a popular narrative. What’s good about modern culture (and annoying, but mostly good) is that singular works don’t have the kind of authority they once did, so there’s room for every version of Gatsby, especially the literary version, to be in the cultural consciousness as different takes on a common story. It’s the variety of perspectives, Fitzgerald’s, Coppola’s and Baz Luhrman’s, that make the story richer. A healthy exchanging of ideas over which perspective is the strongest, or rather the relative merits of each, is a good thing; arguing over whether one or another ought to exist is juvenile.