“Give me a torch, I am not for this ambling. Being but heavy, I will bear the light”
This Quotation tells us that torch bears at a masque but Romeo did not take part in dancing or flirting. To cheer Romeo up, Mercutio tells Romeo fake Dream about Romeo and Queen Mab hath. Romeo disturbs Mercutio in middle of the story because he might wants to stop any further bawdiness from Mercutio. While Benvolio say’s to Romeo and mercutio to stop wasting time,
“This wind you talk of blows us from ourselves”
This Quotation tells us that Benvolio seriously wants to go inside. He says that we are wasting time, we won’t get what we came for if we keep on arguing like this.
Romeo was looking forward to see Rosaline at the feast. Romeo and his friends were not invited to Capulet’s party but it was a customary to greet the hosts with compliments.
In Act 1 Scene four, Romeo and his friends enter in the Capulet’s feast with their masks on, so they cannot be recognised by the people of Capulet. The maskers were following the drum, music, speakers, dancing. Romeo was looking for Rosaline, but Romeo looks at Juliet and asks one of the servants,
“What lady’s that which doth enrich the hand of yonder knight”
The servant replies “I know not sir”. This makes clear to the audience that Romeo does not know who Juliet is. Romeo shows declaration of his love towards Juliet’s beauty. Romeo says,
“Did my heart love till now? Forswear it sight, for I ne’ar saw true beauty till this night”.
This Quotation proves that Romeo has forgotten about Rosaline, and foolishly been interested in the beauty of Juliet.
While Romeo was describing Juliet beauty, Tybalt heard Romeo speaking and went to Capulet. Capulet says that “here in my house do him disparagement”. This Quotation proves how much Capulet’s hated Montague’s. Capulet is strict harsh, non-understanding man
Romeo doesn’t cared about what was happening around him, he carried on showing declarations towards Juliet and Juliet tries that back up what Romeo says like as ‘sonnet’s’. While Juliet nurse comes along and tells Juliet that her mother wants to have a word with her. Romeo says, “What is her Mother”. Juliet replies that “my mother is the lady of the house”. Romeo gets surprised, and says to himself,
“Is she a Capulet?”
Romeo realises that he likes the daughter of the Capulet’s family, who is also the Enemy of Montague’s family.
While than Romeo exist the scene. Juliet talks with the nurse, Juliet says to the nurse,
“Go ask his name----- IF he’s married”?
The nurse replies that he ‘Romeo’ and one of the Montague’s, “The only son of your great enemy”. Juliet turns aside from the nurse who overhears part of her speech. The rhyme, antitheses, and paradoxes betray Juliet’s anguish of heart. She will love a loathed enemy. The fifth scene ends.
This scene introduced moment of calm after the madness and the noisiness of the previous action where Mercutio and the Montague’s are preparing to gatecrash the party. When Romeo meets Juliet at Capulet feast everything was quiet, so the reader can focus on the characters.
This scene shows a contrast between the superficial and mercenary love of Paris, the sordid affair between Tybalt and lady Capulet and the pure, true love of Romeo and Juliet. I think that this is very interesting scenes to watch because it is a party scene where everyone is enjoying.
Baz Luhrman film is set at fictional Latino quarter, Verona beach in America. The location of luhrman film was very different to Zefferellis version. In zefferellis version the Capulet’s are dressed in yellow and red clothes, while the Montague’s are dressed in Blues. In Luhrman Montague’s version they wore beach type of clothes which were colourful and the Capulet’s were in tight black leather clothes or in suits. This gives Capulet’s stronger reactions towards other people. The Capulet’s also used strong language, as Capulet says to Tybalt,
“Am I the master here or you? Go to”
Also in Zefferellis version the music was really slow and Shakespeare used flute instruments because there wasn’t any effective technology invented. Unlike in Luhrman film short angels cameras are used very often and things really move quickly, again with the help of the latest technology, for e.g. flashlights.
The film by Baz luhrman and Zefferellis version, both films had appropriate methods and supports for the film. In Zefferellis version, they could not have a newsreader and in the Luhrman film the actors wore normal clothes because of the time and age. In Zefferellis film, the actors and actresses wore amazing, extravagant costumes. By the time of Zefferellis, these types of clothes were perfect to attract audience. By looking at the clothes, the spectator would appreciate the importance of the two families. In Luhrmann's film everyone was wearing usual, everyday clothes, so there was no way that; you could tell the individuals were from important families. Also, in the two versions, the weapons used were different. Luhrmann's film used guns and Zeffirelli's film used swords. Another technique that Luhrman used was the old language. The whole film was very up to date, but Luhrman decided to maintain Shakespeare's old English in his action picture. I found this really good, but it was also really confusing to understand the language.
There were also lots of symbols and imagery used in Luhrman film. The images, figures of speech, and rhetoric of Romeo and Juliet have been described as tentative, crude, extravagant, and conventional. The image of ‘bud’, ‘flower’, and canker reflects the story of lovers Romeo and Juliet. At the beginning of the film, Romeo passion is as a ‘cankered’ but the fresh bud of the love among Romeo and Juliet is promises a beauteous flower. The family hates that is their enemy is ‘cankered’ as well is their other enemy death which at last deflowers Juliet and so contacts of with the bridal-tomb and romantic death themes.
When Romeo ask Juliet’s nurse about who is Juliet’s mother. She replies that, she is the lady of the house. Romeo than says, ‘my life is my foe’s debt’. This quotation tells us Romeo’s feelings when he heard that he likes Juliet who is enemy of Montague’s. Than in same way, Juliet describes her feelings to her nurse by using rhyming paradoxes. The themes in the poem used are always contrasting of each other, like love-hate, love-death, fortune-misfortune, light-dark, day-night, youth-age.
The reason Luhrman film got so many repeated images is because he wants to keep the audience interested, keep reminding them about what has all ready happened in the film so far. The main reason behind this is Luhrman probably wants the audience to be excited and look forward where the journey of both lovers can take them. Although the most of the language is been written as rhyming couplets and has also been used in Shakespearian ways, but it is good enough to keep the audience interested by using effective actions performed in the film by the two lovers and other actors, e.g. the acting of Mercutio and Tybalt has been used differently to attract different audiences. By this I mean Mercutio is vitality, cynicism, insolence, and irrepressible bawdiness which make him a brilliantly effective stage actor. The audience who likes this kind of actor or language might be interested in him/her.
Both movies were excellently produced but I personally prefer Luhrman version of Romeo and Juliet because it is much more modern and I can relate to it. Zefferellis version of Romeo and Juliet is very well made and had a lot of thought put into it but it won’t appeal to everybody because it is aimed at Shakespeare fans. Also the language used in zefferellis film was difficult to understand and especially the nation of today. Probably when Zefferellis first made this film, everyone might have been interested in it because everyone might have spoken in the same way as they did in Zefferellis film. Understanding the language probably wasn’t that difficult for them, especially if you were a poetry writer, but I like Luhrman film better because it has more action, strong language, and very well made by using flashlights or doing fast motions. I like the acting and verse used by Romeo and Juliet. It was really amazing how both actors, ‘Romeo’ and ‘Juliet’ used rhyming couplets, and how they created images. Doing this as between me and my friend is really difficult and defiantly we need a lot understanding in the English language.
