Page 65 - Shakespeare in the Movie From the Silent Era to Shakespeare in Love

54 I Shakespeare in the Movies

For Shakespeare, the heart and soul of Romeo and Juliet was a
vision of two morally fine people who want to do the right thing.
Their tragedy is that they find themselves in a no-win situation:
Remaining true to their families or to their prince proves mutually
exclusive. They are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Their attempt to marry in the eyes of God represents a doomed
desire to follow the rules when the rules are right. What we see is
not revolution for the hell of it; rather, rebellion in the service of
greater good. "See," the Prince says with a sigh, "how Heaven finds
ways to kill your hate with love."
Shakespeare expressed the families' reconciliation in words. Zef-
firelli replaces them with a powerful image; members of both house-
holds, in separate mourning lines, converge to carry the caskets
together. Only a variation on primitive sacrifice of innocent victims
can replace civil sickness with health, dispersing anarchy through
restored order. This was the essence of tragedy for the ancients;
Shakespeare and Zeffirelli repeat that tragic conception in Renais-
sance and contemporary terms. In the end, the sick city experiences
the necessary catharsis.
A complex Moresque dance was added for the Capulets' ball,
expressing the relationships between various partygoers through on-
screen movement. The gathered multitude become perfectly real-
ized human beings in brief snatches of dazzling imagery. Also added
here was Nino Rota's "Love Theme From Romeo and Juliet." The
song is halfway between a period ballad and a hippie-era tune and
connects historical trappings with modern attitudes.
Just as Castellani offered his version of why Friar John failed to
deliver the message, so does Zeffirelli. Whereas Castellani's slowed
down the action, Zefirelli brilliantly hit on a briefer but more effec-
tive approach. John doggedly treks toward Mantua, unaware that the
rider swiftly passing him is Balthasar, who wrongly believes Juliet is
dead and hurries to inform his master. As Romeo rides back to join
Juliet in death, he passes John at precisely that moment when the
oblivious friar waters his donkey, his back to the roadway. John
swivels around even as Romeo passes unseen, wordlessly suggesting
the machinery of fate at work, an idea Shakespeare verbally made
clear in Romeo's epiphany: "Some [horrific] consequence, yet hang-
ing in the stars" will result from his innocent party-crashing action.
Zeffirelli's decision to drop the duel with Paris at Juliet's tomb
speeds up the slowing action while keeping Romeo sympathetic by
not having him kill such a decent fellow. The decision to eliminate