Baz Luhrmans romeo and Juliet - Essay Example

Baz Luhrman’s Romeo and Juliet s One of the most evergreen and strong love stories of all times is Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”. Although Shakespeare left the world 400 years ago but, his ideas, plays and themes are still present among us. His famous play “Romeo and Juliet” is admired in this era as well and is recognized by the young lovers of the twenty-first century. The themes used by Shakespeare broaden our view towards life and show us a flash of the difficulties, risks and penalties faced in the real life.

(The Themes of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet)In 1995, Baz Luhrmann in his film “Romeo and Juliet” won the hearts of most of the audience, especially the young generation of this era. He revived the ideas and themes of Shakespeare and gave them a new touch while keeping the mood and confidence high of Shakespeare’s original play by making one of the most genuine and honest versions of “Romeo and Juliet”.The themes presented in the film in 1995 are still relevant today as well because they are applicable to the real life, especially the theme of the revenge in the film, which turned out to be one of the most memorable scenes.

In this scene Luhrmann demonstrates his creativity by different camera angles to make the scene more attractive and dramatic. As Romeo chases Tybalt in his car to take revenge from him, the director gives another camera touch to the scene by turning the sky color into dark. The dark sky gives a more real effect of the revenge and the anger of Romeo which led him to kill Tybalt, because Tybalt had killed Mercutio (Romeo’s friend). This uncontrollable anger of Romeo was displayed to be very natural as in the real word, anyone would be madly furious at the murderer of his close one.

(Film Reviews: Directors Decisions in Romeo and Juliet) The other themes presented in the film include the war between the love of two unlike people and the total destruction of hatred of the world, the light and pleasure of their love and the darkness of the dispute between their families, their terrible fate and the determination of their love. All these themes were presented by Shakespeare 400 years ago and as Luhrmann wanted the film to be made the way Shakespeare would want it to be, so just a few minor changes were made by Luhrmann like replacing swords and knives with guns and horses with cars, so as to modernize the film and present it according to the 20th century audience.

Apart from this, rest of the themes were displayed the same in his film as well but were presented more energetically, with some new music-video flash, violent and rock sound tracks and some hip-hop that drew a large number of teen audience becoming diehard fans of the film. (Modern Film Adaptations of Shakespeare; Romeo and Juliet: Of its Time and of Ours) These all themes, mainly relate to the disobedience of parents, law and order, family honor and the society by many characters of the play, including Romeo and Juliet themselves, the results of which had to be faced by both of them through their deaths in the end of the play.

These themes are still relevant as in this era as well, because young and passionate lovers are faced by such opposing circumstances and believe love is more important than life and in some cases, some love stories result in the case of suicidal deaths of both lovers, just as the deaths of the lovers displayed in the film. (Lipley, 2010)BibliographyThe themes of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet [Internet] DocShare. Available from. [Accessed 3 August 2011]Film Reviews: Directors Decisions in Romeo and Juliet [Internet] Reviews; Wikinut.

Available from [Accessed 3 August 2011]Modern Film Adaptations of Shakespeare; Romeo and Juliet: Of its Time and of Ours [Internet] Fathom. Available from. [Accessed 3 August 2011]Lipley. (2010) Romeo and Juliet [Internet] Essay Depot. Available from. [Accessed 3 August 2011]