Romeo & Juliet (B.Luhrmann)

Baz Luhrmann would have to be able to intertwine these issues with the main plot, to make the film more relevant and meaningful to the modern day audience.
             The setting used in Zeferelli's version of Romeo and Juliet was a traditional medieval city in Italy- busy with life, bustling with people, with a romantic backdrop to it. Baz Luhrmann's version took place in 20th century America (it was filmed in New Mexico City)- dirty, grungy and polluted- it almost seems as though it is decaying. Although Luhrmann dramatically changes the setting of the film, he does not alter the language used in the play, or the main plot- he remains completely faithful to the original. This was done very successfully, as the film will still appeal to people in the older generation as well as younger people. The opening of Luhrmann's film features a television set with an American news reporter reading out the prologue. This immediately sets the time of which the film is set, and also the location in which it is set at. The prologue of the Zeferelli version, however, features a long shot of a medieval England landscape and has a voice over of an English man, reading the prologue. Immediately, one can see the difference between them already- different moods were created- aimed at different audiences. The mood created in Luhrmann's version is a lot more tantalising, exciting and fast- it will attract the attention of movie-goers a lot more effectively then Zeferelli's version would have, and retain the attention a lot better then what the older version would have been able to do. .
             Another problem that was successfully overcome by Luhrmann's production was the fact that Juliet was a thirteen-year-old girl when this was taking place. At the time in which Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet, it would have been believable that a thirteen-year-old girl would find herself in the predicament that Juliet finds herself in.