Compare Shakespeare's Presentation of Love and Hate in 'romeo and Juliet' to Baz Luhrmann's 1996 Filmic Adaptation

'Romeo and Juliet' is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare, in his early career, set in a patriarchal society. The director Baz Luhrmann made his own cinematic adaptation of the play in 1996, making an ideal subject to compare to.

Various devices are used in both the play and the film, including forewarning. Forewarning is used from the start of the play, with the prologue, which gives away most of the plot to the audience. Lines like "Civil blood makes civil hands unclean" and "Doth with their death bury their parent's strife" set the mood and tension, which will be developed later throughout the play. This forewarning marks the inevitability of Romeo and Juliet's story, forming tension between the audience and the stage. The metaphor with the 'civil blood' adds to this effect, further adding tension, as blood is a striking word, putting the audience on edge.

Similarly, Luhrmann's adaption creates this identical mood and tension, by making the prologue a fast paced, urgent news report. On screen, images of the town in ruins and a picture of a broken ring gives away the fate of the story. This is done in a news report style, as breaking or shocking news is usually communicated through in this way, making the prologue sound even more urgent. Jump cuts of the 'City of Angels' shows it in ruin, with a statue of God overlooking the two family's mansions, showing an element of religion, yet God has done nothing to help them, adding a sense of futility.

The characters in the play are marked out as hateful characters by either the lines they say, or by their actions. Tybalt is an example of this. When he first appears in the play, he is immediately put across as evil when he says "Peace? I hate the word." The fact that he is then shown as a man of importance, as Juliet's cousin, the audience cannot help but suspect that he will be trouble later. He is again portrayed as evil at the Capulet's party, when he is desperate to get rid of Romeo, yet is stopped by Capulet.

The filmic reworking transmits this same feeling about Tybalt, when he exits his car, he is shown as a man of stature, as the first shot of him is of his boot, which is putting out a match, with which he has lit his cigarette. This straight away gives us the impression that he is important. At the Capulet party, Luhrmann further endorses the hatred of Tybalt by giving him a devil attire, the devil being an image of pure evil and hate, making it the ideal costume.

Shakespeare also manages to create a hatred of hate, as the main cause for Romeo and Juliet's death is the hatred between the families. We distinguish this when Juliet says to herself, "My only love sprung from my only hate", meaning that the love between Romeo and her is put in danger by their family's feud. This means that when they both end their lives at the end of the play, we feel sadness for them, yet hatred for their families who caused their own children's deaths.

Comparatively, the film shows this too. The finale of the movie is