Keeping the mood in Romeo+Juliet

       After watching the movie Romeo + Juliet by Baz Luhrman I was really amazed at how the weather and overall lighting of the movie almost told the story itself. The movie tells the tale of "two star-crossed lovers"who end up taking there own life at the end.The movie is specifically based  in modern day US even though the original play is based in the Elizabethan era. Even though this movie isn't formatted the same as the original Shakespeare play, it's very closely knit to the original play and in some ways is better for our generation to see. Throughout this movie like I mentioned weather and lighting plays a prominent part in crafting the movie and setting the mood of it. I think that this is very important in all movies and especially in this movie where the script is in older english and the audience may find it hard to understand whats going on in the movie. This use of the lighting and weather can really help to set a general idea of the movie for the members of the audience who don't have any clue what is going on in the movie.


     If I could, I would unpack the whole movie, but theres way too many examples so i'm only going to do the very large important ones. In the beginning of the movie the scene sets with a fight. Hopefully you would know this from all the other details but if you didn't the sharp bright and intense looking lighting really does it's job here and explains it. The bright, sharp look really helps you see the stressful, alive, quick setting that you would feel in a fight. In another scene after Romeo has met Juliet and he has to leave it starts raining. This part of the video becomes slightly blurry and the sky becomes dark. I think that the rain here really represents the happiness that Romeo and Juliet share when there together but the sadness and "tears" they exchange when it comes time for them to leave each other.In another scene Romeo is sitting by the beach with his head hanging low smoking. This part of the video is blurred and in the background the sun is setting over the horizon. I think this setting sun really represents his depression from not being with Juliet. The sun generally represents life and happiness so in this example his happiness is going away where he wont be able to see it.


        In conclusion the lighting and the weather in Romeo + Juliet the movie represents the overall mood and really helps to guide any confused audience. When I say this I can tell you that i'm not lying. These different details that may seem like minor useless information really helped me to understand the events of the movie much better.Without them where would the movie be. I really don't think that people would enjoy any movie where the setting(weather) and lighting had absolutely no significance int the mood or structure of the movie.