Rating: 
Summary: Claire Danes is cute...
Review: I guess I was just being a typical guy when I came up with the title for the review. Ok, back to business. I thought the film was unique. The story of the tragedy (that's what the original play is) is presented to the audience as a news report about two star-crossed lovers that took their own lives in Verona (Verona Beach, that is).I read Romeo and Juliet in high school (a long time ago). (It was about time I refreshed my memory.) This movie has all the essential plot elements of the play. (How Romeo meets and falls in love with Juliet. How they elope. How Mercutio's death spurs Romeo into action by taking Tybalt's life. How Romeo is exiled. How Juliet is forced to marry Paris. How the priest conceives of a plan to bring Romeo and Juliet together. How that plan fails and they end up dying side-by-side.) It's made to look "cool", sorta like an MTV video. Each scene is brightly lit and colorful. Instead of daggers and swords, everyone carries a gun. (I mean everyone. They even have to check their guns at the door at various places.) All the characters seem to have been given a 20th century equivalent role to play. The apothecary is now a drug dealer. The priest, well, he's still a priest. The narrator is at times the news reporter and at times the police chief. The Montagues and Capulets are big time businessmen. To tell you the truth, most of the dialogue is spoken so fast that I didn't catch much of what they said. DiCaprio and Danes play their parts well. They even looked downright giddy when they first meet. As for Romeo and Tybalt's gang, they were annoying. I also couldn't get over the fact that Mercutio was in fact not played by Chris Rock! It's some guy called Harol Perineau. In one scene he dressed in drag and started singing. I got a little weirded out. All in all, it was a refreshing retelling of the Romeo and Juliet story. I would recommend picking up a CliffNotes for those who've never read the play. Knowing the full story and the important lines beforehand will increase your enjoyment of the film. LEAP rating (each out of 5):
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L (Language) - 3 (mostly spoken too fast)
E (Erotica) - 0.5 (don't expect anything like Shakespeare in Love)
A (Action) - 1.5 (lots of pointless shooting)
P (Plot) - 5 (it is Shakespeare's classic love story/tragedy after all)
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful version
Review: I am tired of folks saying things like Shakespeare would roll in his grave over this film etc etc etc.
Umm folks Shakespeare was not considered the greatest writer of his time, he was in many ways the George Lucas of the Elizabethan era. His writing was for the enjoyment of the rich and the poor and it was not to be taken as seriously as so many take it today!
So stop acting as if he was this great icon of his time, he was an actor who started writing and I truly believe he would appreciate Baz's version of his play. The way Baz takes the play out of it's classical scene and places it in the modern day and still keeps the beauty of the story intact is simply thrilling.
The way the two houses are protrayed as modern day mafia-like gangs with their rumbles and fights and the pistols given the names of the classical swords that would be used in a more period version was very smart and inventive.
Claire Danes is a stunning Juliet and Leo does an excellent job as Romeo. No I'm not a Leo fan but I think he gets to bad a rap simply because he was such a fad for awhile there. John Leguizamo is a marvelously slimy Tibalt. The actor play Mercutio has a particularly intersting roll and the way Baz twists the end of the play ever so slightly makes this almost a whole new piece.
The music is stunning, if there is anything wrong with this film it is that it was very loud in the theaters and gave me a headache a couple of times, but we all have volume buttons at home so that is not a problem here.
So what are you waiting for?
Rating:
Summary: Brillant Modern day remake of the classic bard's tale
Review: This latest version of the bard's classic play is set in an urban jungle ruled by warring gang families. Pistols carelessly twirled and menacingly cocked replace swords and daggers (or the switchblades of West Side Story). Romeo's best friend, Mercutio, has been reduced to a cross-dressing disco queen who offers him a mind-altering drug to help him party. Gaudy religious icons fill the screen, including neon crosses, cheaply cast Madonnas and garish paintings of Christ. The famous balcony scene, rewritten as an immodest romp in the Capulet swimming pool, finds Romeo (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Juliet (Claire Danes) pledging undying love for each other on the very night they meet. Smouldering hormones pass for romance. The star-crossed lovers are secretly married the following day, and share a night of passion that some young viewers may be inspired to imitate without regard for vows and rings. "DiCaprio and Danes make the bandying of words a sly, erotic game," gushed Rolling Stone critic Peter Travers. "Shakespeare has never been this sexy onscreen." There's another reason Romeo & Juliet earned a PG-13 rating. While not explicit, the film's violence is vicious and vengeful as Romeo runs down and guns down the Capulet who stabs his gender-bending buddy. In the fictional dog-eat-dog land of Verona Beach, nearly everyone carries a designer handgun, and screeches from drive-by to drive-by in trashy cars with vanity plates. The city is in a constant state of chaos . . . and life is cheap. The most disturbing and potentially dangerous scene romanticizes the tragic couple's climactic double suicide. Romeo drinks poison. Juliet puts a pistol to her head and pulls the trigger. The camera pulls back. We see the lovers lying together peacefully amid hundreds of flickering candles. What image does this present to despondent and self-destructive adolescents? Death brings tranquility. Teens convinced that the future is empty and hopeless (as they've been told in countless CDs and music videos) could mimic the movie's poetic quick-fix, resulting in real-life tragedy. Director Baz Luhrmann's Romeo & Juliet is a stylish, yet empty assault on the senses which, in the end, is more intrigued with cultural bedlam than with the doomed relationship of its namesakes. What light through yonder projection room window breaks? It is Romeo & Juliet. And it is trouble.
Rating: 
Summary: Another ruined classic.
Review: The film that surely made Shakespeare turn in his grave. This is another crappy attempt to modernize a classic tale. Don't fix it if it's not broken.
Rating:
Summary: William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet"? No, Baz's "R+J".
Review: I remember when this movie came out, all my classmates were seeing it and talking about it, my school got free book covers with Leonardo and Clare until I could hardly stand their faces any more, and I was greatly surprised to hear my chorus teacher give it rave reviews, it was after all, a teen flick, right? But even though I had a great curiosity regarding such a strange movie, I didn't see it. It wasn't till after I had seen Moulin Rouge that I took the intitiative to see this film. I find it fairly amusing that the "official" title of this film is "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet", everyone and their uncle knows who wrote it. Everyone and their uncle knows the story. Quite frankly, when I saw it, I was expecting to be bored. I knew how it went, I had read it twice, I had been hearing the story in every vessel of artistic interpretation all my life, from Zeffirelli to Bernstein (well, I love West Side Story). It had been played out, there's only so much mileage you can get. And to me it wasn't Hamlet or King Lear or Much Ado about Nothing which still could hold you enthralled just by a reading. "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet"? What else is new? Sure it's genius, but now, quite simply, it was boring. But this isn't simply Shakespeare's movie, it's Baz Luhrmann's. It made me weep. Where you might think a hip and slick take on a timeless story has been played out, it has elsewhere, but not here. Luhrmann infuses something into it. The film is sinister, it's intense, it's rough and awkward, it colorful, it's muted, it's passion frenzy, it's dry, it's slick and sophisticated. It's meticulous and strange and cold and white hot all at once. He shoves it all into Venice Beach and actors and those so very famous beautiful poetic lines and mixed with a complete and total disregard for convention. Like Moulin Rouge, there's an obsession with details. The background is filled to the brim with every sort of window or bookshelf dressing or religious icon, flowers, car wheel caps, clothing styles, the way hedges are trimmed, and billboards. Nothing is left out. Luhrmann immerses you into another world, it's 1996, but it's not where we're living. Thus we can relate to these people yet still accept this insanity. And that's fitting, the world Shakespeare was evoking wasn't his own secular society either, he was trying to strip it down to the human qualities of a story. That's why a modern American plain accented actor speaking this complicated dialogue works. We're allowed to believe that these people would talk like this. And the actors give it life and a palpability. It's excellently casted. They give every line with emotion, they act it out, using themselves, but realistically. Danes and Dicaprio are excellent. The various supports do great justice to their roles. It was a joy and a wonder to watch, to see what Shakespeare had intended, with good actors performing well on such a colorful and wacky stage. Above all the emotional power of the story, which can be beaten out during mandatory reading periods or a repeated session with a bland and average version again and again, remains firm. Especially during the last part of the film. There are no superfluous motions or gestures on the actors' part. They act it to a tee. Baz leaves no emotion or possibility unturned. The blocking and directing gets the best out of the story. For example: Romeo walks through a dazzling and dark candlelit and flower and statue strewn chapel to find Juliet, and he weeps and weeps while saying his lines. This is the imagery and intepretation that flows throughout the movie. This is a movie that had a lot of effort and thought and heart and honesty put into it. It has a character and a charisma that I think is lacking in many films today. No one has ever seen the version Shakespeare envisioned, he doesn't give staging or actor's notes, he didn't provide a cliffsnotes version. No one alive can pass down the directions to a performance Shakespeare was present at. Taking this into consideration, Luhrmann created a respectful yet completely unique and enlightening spin on a story that no matter how brilliant, can still get botched by poor translation. I think he extracted the essence of a timeless and beautiful story, and made something incredible. At least he finally made me appreciate it.
Rating:
Summary: The Best movie ever
Review: This movie is awesome Leonardo DiCaprio is the best Romeo yet
Rating:
Summary: Shakespeare as Served by Taco Bell
Review: William Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet' has been performed and adapted countless times, and, unfortunately, most of said adaptations have been utterly unable to arouse more than fleeting interest in our current young generation. Consequently, I have to admit that my anticipation for this new interpretation by Baz Luhrman was restrained and, in fact, even somewhat pessimistic. Still, as an antidote to the banal merriment of the Christmas season, during which the film was initially in release, it serves well. The modern setting, though at first glance somewhat unsettling and irritating, anchors the interpretation of Shakespeare's romantic tragedy in a context familiar to the actors and audience. The acting is unexpectedly robust, considering the fact that a majority of the actors are in fact not (or at least weren't at the time) theatrically trained. One cannot but wonder if passion of such intensity was ever known by any of these plucky teens, these tumbleweeds in the desert of drama. The set and costumes are harmoniously combined and very worthwhile, within the context of a modern rendering. And the set design, too, is immensely resourceful, if not immensely successful. The costumes demonstrate a primal polarity of colors to differentiate the opposing forces as they tear asunder the dramatic passion binding Romeo and Juliet. Indeed, just as the spirit of Johann Sebastian Bach gives life to lifeless digital sound canvas, so can the spirit of Shakespeare illuminate any shadowy modern context. 'Romeo and Juliet' is a treasure that benefits the world of the dramatic arts by transforming the detached audience into emotional participants. Yes, 'Romeo and Juliet', like Taco Bell, appeals to those seeking spicy freshness in a context of rapid deployment! In case you haven't noticed, the above paragraphs contained generous portions of sarcasm. In actuality, this adaptation is a dull, botched one, a far cry from say Franco Zeffirelli's stunningly erotic version. Updating the plays of Shakespeare has obviously occupied the minds of many directors before, but it is a good idea to try to occupy the minds of the audience as well. After all, while this is not the Bard's best play, it unarguably contains his best poetry; that is because the play is also about language, about the difference between what something is and the language used to describe it. Hence, this may be one of the hardest Shakespearean plays to adapt to a modern setting. In part this may be due to the dramatic asides, which broadcast private remarks for all to hear, except the target of the remark, but even more importantly the play suffers from another blessing, which is also a curse: the enormous power of the story itself. Any failure to do it justice is likely to be perceived as monumental. Such is the fate of Luhrmans's film, a poppy and incoherent music video mess. The cast's endeavors to render the Bard's language more relaxed and informal are disastrous, as are the countless Mexican standoffs and gunfights that replace the swordfights of the original play. Danes and DiCaprio are utterly lost here, as is any semblance of sense or continuity. Rather than immersing the audience, the MTV style quickly becomes dull and extremely distracting. Ah, but try to tell that to the teenyboppers! To attempt it is to carelessly stroll into a hedonist (...) in Birkenstock sandals, step on every single bare foot, imbibe all half-finished glasses of Maraschino liqueur, smoke a La Gloria Cubana and engage people in tête-à -tête concerning the European Monetary Union - very silly. They'll just look at you all googly-eyed and inform you that `Leo is sooooooooo hot!' Bah!
Rating:
Summary: Nice to watch after reading..
Review: I thought this was a great movie. It shows us in our current era, the views on what happens in Romeo and Juliet. The fact that Mercutio is a drug addict, cross-dressing, african-american (Which not many do know about) was quite interesting and did prove his char. well. I was stunned the most at Leo and Claire's acting skills very much. The only thing I do recommend is to read the play first, or you may not catch on to fast. I saw this in my English class, and I thought it was nice to watch other then just reading it.
Rating:
Summary: This was a Baz Masterpiece!!
Review: I didn't know much about Shakespeare before this film. Now seeing how beautiful the language truly is makes the movie breathtaking. The acting is phenomenal. Baz Luhrmann is a genius at his best (besides "Moulin Rouge!)But if you won't let them tell you this story and if you can't go beyond the norm, you won't like it.
Rating:
Summary: Open Mind Folks!
Review: We have been watching this movie in our eighth grade English class, as well as reading the play Romeo and Juliet, as well as meeting with our Shakespearean expert who just happens to work at our school to act out scenes. Not only that, but we have also been studying the Shakespeare's time period. That being said, let me also say that Shakespeare was not this serious man who didn't understand comedy. In fact it was quite the opposite. True, Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy but is a comedy as well. That's how most of his works are. An example of this is how he would cast men as women. Just the sight of this would bring laughs from the audience. With all that understood, the movie Romeo and Juliet is a great adaptation.
We have only watched the first 30 minutes, and I might add more to this review once we finish it, or when I get the DVD, whichever comes first! But I loved the newscaster as the chorus. What a creative touch. As for the swords or guns controversy, this is set in modern times. Who uses swords in our day? But to keep the Old English was smart. After all, what is Romeo and Juliet without Old English? It would not be the same. I mean, the famous Queen Mab's speech in anything but Old English? Hard to imagine. And te contrast between Old English and modern times was a very interesting one. And even if it was written in today's language, it would be too much like West Side Story. They wanted to stick to the roots of Romeo and Juliet. Also for all those people who criticized Mercutio for being a drag queen, he is not a drag queen or a transvestite. Well what can I say? This is the modern version. The performance given by Leonardo DiCaprio is great, he speaks Old English like he's spoken it his entire life. However Juliet, I don't quite agree with. I don't think she brought her best to this film. The acting isn't the best and she looks quite bland compared to Romeo, who is quite handsome, and I don't really understand the whole Cuban thing with Juliet's family.
All in all, a great film, one that must be seen with an open mind, otherwise don't even bother to watch it at all. It was filmed to show today's fourteen year old's that yes, Shakespeare lived in the 1600's and true, Romeo and Juliet takes place in the 1400's but it has a universal message of love, one that can still be understood today, even if it is 2004.
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