Romeo And Juliet Movie Vs Play Essay

Classics are tales that have enjoyed and endured countless remakes and redos of the original. Many of Shakespeare's plays are better and different now than they were in 1597. The poetry, exchanges between couples and the idea that love is a foolish thing are often not understood by the modern audience. The ideas of the play are not always portrayed correctly into the film. People have different standards for a play than a film. Since, the audience doesn’t always have the patience for the way that it was originally written the director may pare down the lines, and doing this can cause the lines to lose their meaning. Because of this and many other factors, Shakespeare's plays aren’t always given the justice. A perfect example of a film not
The original play is not meant to be a comedy but a heart-wrenching tragedy. In the first scene of the film, Sampson is being beaten over the head by a woman with a purse. Not only is he beaten with a purse but is making strange squeaking noises. This added comedy does make the film more entertaining but the original scene is intense and is meant to show the rivalry and hatred that is present between the two families. Not only is this scene butchered with comedy but there is a large presence of unnecessary and over-exaggerated theatrics. Tybalt rolls over a car and in an extremely exaggerated fashion equips his gun with a sight and shoots one of the Montagues as they drive off. Going back to the balcony scene that rather than on the balcony takes place on a pool deck you have the unnecessary addition of comedy once again. “O, be some other name. What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet;”[II.ii. L.42-45], while Juliet is speaking her lines Romeo is following her and when he says something she screams and they both fall into the pool. Though this is funny it ruins the beautiful lines that are being spoken by Juliet and detracts from the romance that is usually present in that scene. And further, in this scene, the lines are interrupted by a security guard and Juliet looks at him and smiles as if nothing was going on. Once again
In the case of Baz Luhrmann's 1996 film Romeo + Juliet, Luhrmann unsuccessfully transforms the tragedy-filled story of Romeo and Juliet to a modern in an unsuccessful manner. Luhrmann’s film while entertaining loses the ideas that can be found in the original play. Luhrmann adds many elements to the film that could not be found in the play such as comedy and ridiculous theatrics.With the addition of the comedy and theatrics, you have the fact that the film takes place in Verona Beach, California rather than in Verona, Italy and despite the new modernized setting the old Shakespearean English is still used. Because Shakespearean English is still used the lines are often muddled and hard to understand because the lines are rushed through or muffled or spoken in unrecognizable volume and voice. In some scenes throughout the film, the comedy and unnecessary humor and theatrics detract from originally serious making them funny and less intense. This when paired with the bad pacing and how terribly the lines have spoken the lines that were originally beautifully constructed and immaculately spoken are destroyed it makes for a terrible remake of an originally beautiful play. The way that Luhrmann constructed his film caused Shakespeare's true meaning of the play to be lost in the attempt to bring the film