APUSH Goes to the Movies: The Great Gatsby

<p>Today on APUSH for ALL, we’re watching <em>The Great Gatsby</em> not just as a famous story, but as a window into the 1920s. Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 film gives us parties, cars, jazz, money, longing, and spectacle, but beneath the glitter is a sharper historical question: what did the American Dream look like when it was filtered through wealth, consumer culture, inequality, Prohibition, racism, and changing gender roles? Gatsby’s world is dazzling, but it is also unstable. As we watch, we’ll ask what the film reveals, what it simplifies, and what it leaves out about modern America.</p>