The Great Gatsby takes place in the upper class area of Long Island. The main character, Nick Carraway, moves to Long Island and sees the rich lifestyle of the people he meets. This movie portrays the American Dream as a certain status or class. The characters in the film all live lavish life styles. The movie shows this by their homes, boats, and clothing. Also, there are multiple scenes of lavish looking parties. Nick Carraway sits back throughout the movie and just watches it all. He sees how the people of Long Island live their life. This movie portrays the American Dream as something you can only experience through living the lavish and rich life of the characters in the film. If you do not live a lifestyle such as this one, essentially this movie is saying that you are not living the American Dream. A prime example of this is the scene where Tom stops at a gas station to meet an old friend. The setting in the movie shows that the owner of the gas station is not living a lavish lifestyle. Tom tells the gas station’s owner to go away with him. I believe this symbolizes what this movie portrays as the American Dream. Tom wanted to take the girl away from the plain, old gas station and take her to Long Island so she can live the lavish and fun lifestyle or “American Dream”. This portrayal shows how the American Dream is sometimes caught up in the idea of greed. Yes, we all want to pursue our won happiness and make a good life for ourselves but as this film show, we can sometimes get caught up in having all the materials in the world and live a rich, greedy lifestyle which truly does not lead to happiness.
