Comparison of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet and the 1996 remake by Baz Luhrmann
             Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet was written in the late 1500's. Critics tended to disparage this play in comparison to the four great tragedies Shakespeare wrote in the first decade of the seventeenth century (Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth and Othello). Assessed next to the Bard's mature works, Romeo and Juliet appears to lack the psychological depth and the structural complexity of Shakespeare's later tragedies. But over the past three decades or so, many scholars have altered this assessment, effectively upgrading its status within Shakespeare's canon. They have done this by discarding comparative evaluation and judging Romeo and Juliet as a work of art in its own right. Viewed from this fresh perspective, Shakespeare's tragic drama of the "star-crossed" young lovers is seen to be an extraordinary work. Indeed, Romeo and
             Juliet was an experimental stage piece at the time of its composition, featuring several radical departures from long-standing conventions. These innovative aspects of the play, moreover, reinforce and embellish its principal themes. The latter include the antithesis between love and hate, the correlative use of a light/dark polarity, the handling of time (as both theme and as structural element), and the prominent status accorded to Fortune and its expression in the dreams, omens and forebodings that presage its tragic conclusion.
             With the interest from the critics in this day and age, it is not surprising Baz Luhrmann decided to make his own rendition of the Shakespeare tragedy in 1996. In Baz Luhrmann's 120-minute version of Romeo and Juliet, the scenes are very similar to the way things are today, except the characters are speaking the language of the Shakespearean time period. Luhrmann uses a variety of spectacular effects in the movie. Luhrmann cast huge stars of the teen generation, Claire Daines as Juliet, and Leonardo...