How does Baz Luhrmann's film adaptation of the Prologue from 'Romeo and Juliet' visually highlight Shakespeare's rich imagery and language?

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How does Baz Luhrmann’s film adaptation of the Prologue from ‘Romeo and Juliet’ visually highlight Shakespeare’s rich imagery and language?

Shakespeare’s use of language reflects the theatre of his day as the audience had to imagine much more than in a contemporary theatre.  In late 16th Century Britain, there were no ‘sets’, artificial ‘lightning’ or elaborate ‘sound effects’.  Also, there were only a few actors playing different parts in similar costumes and the plots could easily be misunderstood. Therefore, language and imagery had to do all the work as words were the only tools available to help the audience to imagine the scenes vividly.  I will analyse the Prologue to highlight Shakespeare’s use of language for dramatic purposes and compare it to the film director Baz Luhrmann’s interpretation of this in his language for his film version.

The Prologue is vital; it highlights the major parts of the plot in the play, eliminates potential confusion and acts as an informative ‘trailer’ for the play. It gives us information about the setting, some background information about its principal characters, and emphasizes key events of the plot in the play.   Within the Prologue, the chorus acts like a single dramatic narrator summarising these important events to communicate the themes more easily.  In the modern film adaptation, the Prologue is played three times over to confirm its importance to the play.  Firstly, the news reporter on a television reports back the incident by reading out the Prologue formally and provides facts for the audience.  At the top right corner of the television screen is a picture of a broken star-crossed ring with the words ‘star-crossed lovers’ below.  The broken ring informs us that the ending is going to be a tragic.  Then Luhrmann zooms into the television and uses extreme long shots zooming down on Verona and close- up shots on signs around Verona City, establishing the setting.  Key words like ‘ancient grudge’ and ‘new mutiny’ appear on the flashing text on the screen. Luhrmann also uses MTV editing in the Prologue, showing about forty shots in four seconds highlighting major scenes in the film in a fast jumping sequence.  This visually enforces the role of the Prologue to emphasize key plot points for the viewer’s future understanding.

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Shakespeare uses modifiers to indicate major themes in the play.   The modifier ‘fair’ in front of the word ‘Verona’ suggests that Verona is a peaceful religious place and the words ‘alike in dignity’ imply that the two families are both well-respected in ‘fair’ Verona.  Luhrmann reflects these modifiers in a close up of the statue of Jesus and the newspaper article on both families side by side and Jesus at the middle to highlight that Verona is a peaceful moral town.  The word ‘fair’ is strongly emphasized in the film.  It appears as flashing text on the screen ...

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