Whilst the prologue is restated a second time, news footage from real newsreels and different scenes of the film are fast edited. I imagine the director chose to speed up the prologue to show chaos and to keep the audience interested. As the speaker is speaking the prologue some words he says appear in white writing on a black background. Here the director chose to use colour to put through desired themes to the audience, white symbolising life, innocence and purity and black symbolising death and guilt. The outstanding contrast of black and white also makes the words seem important, making them stand out catching the viewers’ attention. The camera also pans across news paper stalls, filming headlines of what the speaker is saying, and informing the viewers where and when all is happening. I think Baz Luhrmann did this to make the audience feel a sense of reality in what is being said. Then there are also some aerial shots from police helicopters looking down on the city, were the camera has a hand held effect which therefore gives the audience the sensation of being present in the helicopter and looking down on the city with their own eyes.
Even though the prologue is told in Shakespearian English it is set in modern times, I came to this conclusion by noticing guns, clothes worn, modern transport and sky scrapers in the city. There is a lot of fast editing of violent images with zooming sound effects to accentuate the speed of the shots. Some of the shots during the fast editing seem to be so fast that one has to struggle to find ones breathe whilst it’s all happening. Some of the sounds like gun shots and police sirens are heard before the images are seen. In my opinion the director chose to do this to make the audience curious of what’s going to happen next, in a way persuading them to want to see more and therefore creating tension.
‘Religious’ music is constantly getting louder throughout the prologue. In my opinion this effect of music slowly building up was chosen by the director to create a building up of tension. I imagine Baz Luhrmann decides to build up tension in the prologue to symbolise that there might be a building up of tension during the film. There is also a continuous contrast between religion and violence during nearly all of the fast editing of the prologue. I reckon the director decided to make these two opposite themes very dominant during the prologue to suggest to the audience that these could be two important themes of the story. I also suppose the contrast of religion and violence symbolises the battle of love against hate suggested in the film.
In dissimilarity of the constant violent images seen as the prologue goes on lots of crosses, religious statues and places are seen throughout the fast editing. Like between the names ‘Romeo + Juliet’ a cross is being used instead of the word ‘and’. I also noticed that on a newspaper seen during the prologue there are two family trees with a religious statue in the middle. I think the director wanted the audience to feel that religion was the only thing that these two families agree on and have in common. As the camera pans over the city scape two tall sky scrapers towering over the city are seen. Each sky scraper has one surname of the two families. I believe the director chose to do so to show the audience the high status of the families, and used the skyscrapers looking down on the city to symbolise the power they have.
When the speaker finally concludes telling the prologue some important characters are introduced to the audience. As the actors turn towards the camera, the camera stills and the actors are introduced with their character names and relationship they have with the protagonists Romeo and Juliet. I can conclude that Baz Luhrmann decided to introduce the characters using this method to make the audience familiarize with the characters before the film begins. Romeo and Juliet however are not introduced or seen during the prologue. I think the director chose not to include them to suggest to the audience that during the film they have no say in what is going on, even though it all evolves around them. I also imagine this could symbolise a secret love between the two that no one else is aware of.
As the mothers are introduced they look worried, scared and sad whilst on the other hand the fathers are being portrayed to the audience as stereotypical ‘mafia bosses’ in dark cars, smartly dressed and looking angry with serious expressions, which could also be interpreted as a cliché. The relation with the fathers being ‘mafia-like’ could also suggest that the families act like gangster gangs against each other during the film and the fact that it starts from the fathers could show its being going on from generations. Finally, the introductory tone of the start of the film is broken by a black screen with simple text ‘William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet’ emblazoned in red and white. Again, this is an example of the use of colour as a medium for drawing attention to the themes of the play. This final image of the title of the film ending the prologue makes me feel as if the director was trying to make sure it hit the audience making an impact on them.
