Life is fun in the United States of America, during the roaring twenties. While Europe is emerging from the ruins of WWI,
New York’s flaxen youth is hot: it’s the mad period of prohibition, of early cinema, and of the golden age of jazz. Ostentatious luxury is shown everywhere. Gleaming Torpedos dash at breakneck speed from party to party where prohibited alcohol flows like water. People only want to have good times. It is summer 1922, and a newcomer, who says he is called Jay Gatsby, is widely talked about in Long Island, the smart suburb of New York. This
young man is prodigiously rich and the high society rushes to the sumptuous
parties he organises. Every night, his mansion’s garden become a whirlpool of music, dance and champagne, gorgeous girls and elegant young men. From miles around, people come to his place, to show off and have fun. But no one could tell who this man is, and where he is from. Is he a parvenu, a nouveau riche, who has reached the height of glory thanks to dubious schemes? Maybe a mythomaniac? Or maybe an adventurer? His guests make no bones about voicing hypotheses that draw shivers down the spines of romantic young women. Some people even whisper that he has killed a man and drowns his remorse in those extravagant parties. Others assert that he is a war hero or a spy. Faithful to his own legend, Gatsby shrouds himself in mystery and savours his power, his only worry being to please and dazzle everyone. But when the party’s racket is over and when he stands alone in the deserted huge garden, Gatsby becomes another man. A man with troubled, tragic eyes, a man haunted by the ghost of an old
love. This is the man Nick Carraway discovers, one night in June, facing the sea, painfully stretching his arms towards a tiny green light flashing on the other side of the bay. Freshly arrived from birthplace in Middle West, Nick lives in a little
house beside Gatsby’s estate. Shortly, the two men get on well together. Fascinated by his neighbour’s strange personality, Nick is craving to know his secret. On the other side of the bay, close to the pier where the tiny green light shines, there is a billionaire’s residence: Tom Buchanan. Daisy, his wife, is Nick’s
cousin. She is a distinguished charming young woman, a radiant incarnation of a society based on refinement and luxury. Nick openly admires his cousin, but he despises Tom Buchanan, whom he thinks is brutish and bitter. So, when he discovers that Gatsby and Daisy shared a passionate love affair in the past, Nick understands that Gatsby, starting from scratch, build up a huge fortune in a few years’ time, and organised one thousand crazy parties just to conquer again the heart of the only woman he has ever loved. Nick is deeply touched and does not hesitate: he accepts to act as a go-between in his new friend’s favour. One afternoon, under a torrid rain blurring the landscape, a car stops in front of Nick’s house. A door bangs and Daisy, dazzlingly beautiful, her face utterly watered with rain, chats gaily with her cousin, who leads her to the house. Inside, weak and deeply distressed, Gatsby waits. The two lovers’ reunion will be tender and moving. Daisy has not forgotten this beautiful lieutenant whom she had loved with all the ardour of her twenties. But it was such a long time ago, years have gone by, war, silence. Will their love stand the test of time? Gatsby is already taking her along with him towards the great mansion of splendours which he has drawn out of the void for her eyes only to see…
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