The Ottery
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Are Verona Beach Teens Capable of Tragic Insight?

March 19th, 2006

Ten years after everyone else, I’ve finally seen Baz Luhrmann’s version of Romeo and Juliet. Honestly, I think I avoided seeing it because Leonardo DiCaprio was in it, and I fully expected him to whine. And he does—which, come to think of it, is kind of essential to Romeo’s character. That’s the other reason I’d never been that interested in the movie: I’ve never liked the play that much. Romeo and Juliet die because they’re stupid, self-pitying idiots, not because they’re star-cross’d. Maybe I had more patience for them when I actually was a teenager, but, if so, I can’t remember it.

Porpoise’s fascination with Luhrmann’s quirky oeuvre (which, as you probably already know, includes Strictly Ballroom and Moulin Rouge), coupled with the recommendation of another good friend, were enough to make me reconsider seeing the film, and I was glad I did.

Luhrmann’s stated intent for the film was to de-Victorianize Shakespeare, to present the Bard’s work in a form accessible to people from all walks of life, as the original Globe productions were. True Renaissance Shakespeare plays had to keep the attention of drunken, rowdy audiences with all sorts of gimmicks, and Luhrmann saw no problem with doing the same for contemporary moviegoers. Hence the 1990’s “Verona Beach” (I wasn’t sure whether it was supposed to be like L.A. or Miami—turns out it’s Miami) setting, complete with gangsters, transvestites, and priests—and did I mention the hit soundtrack?

The “gimmicks” work, and Luhrmann’s choices make sense within the world he creates. If he’s making a bit of a stretch, he calls attention to it, so that you end up laughing—for example, the guns with a prominent “Longsword” brand label. I accepted it all as part of the bizarre life of his Montagues and Capulets. 

The only moment that jerked me out of my immersion in the film was the final double suicide. You know how it’s supposed to go: Romeo hears that Juliet is dead (when she’s really not), he procures some poison, goes to her tomb, drinks it, kisses her, and dies; then Juliet wakes up, sees that Romeo is dead, and stabs herself. But in Luhrmann’s film, Juliet actually begins to stir as Romeo is blabbing on about how miserable he is—and then she wakes up just as he drinks the poison. He therefore has a moment before he dies in which he actually knows that she is alive and that he’s killed himself for nothing. Ouch.

Then things proceed as normal, only with Juliet shooting, instead of stabbing, herself.

I had to find out why Luhrmann had Juliet wake up early, so I indulged my new obsession and watched the commentary for that scene. It turns out that this was the one place in which he actually borrowed from the Victorian productions he researched, which sometimes ended this way (and some also ended with Romeo and Juliet coming back to life, but thank goodness he didn’t do that). He did indeed choose the overlapping approach because it intensified the torture for the two, thus heightening emotion for the audience as well.

As I’ve been thinking about it, I’ve also realized that you could justify Luhrmann’s choice based on the usual tragic convention of giving the hero a flash of insight before he or she dies (and sometimes, of course, he has to poke his eyes out before he can “see”). The brief moment of overlap does make Romeo and Juliet fit the usual tragedy pattern better.

But are Romeo and Juliet really capable of tragic insight? They are just whiny, lust-stricken teens, after all. Or am I being too harsh?

What do you think?

Entry Filed under: Books, Movies