| dc.description.abstract | Over a period of sixty years, between 1936 and 1996, there were numerous filmed
versions of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, but four in particular were made for and
obtained a worldwide commercial release. George Cukor’s lavish production of 1936
with Norma Shearer as Juliet was the first feature length, big budget, ‘talkie’ of
Shakespeare’s play to be made by a major studio and aimed at the cinema going
public. Shearer remains, to this day, the only actress of the modern age who was a
major film star when cast in the role of Juliet. In direct contrast to this, Renato
Castellani’s Anglo Italian neo-realist, retrospective 1954 adaptation featured an
unknown Susan Shentall, who had never acted before filming and, on completion of
the film, retired and never acted again. Franco Zeffirrelli’s sweeping 1968 production
with Olivia Hussey as Juliet was a worldwide commercial success and is still revered
by many as being the authoritative film experience of the play. Baz Luhrmann’s1996
version, with Claire Danes playing opposite Leonardo DiCaprio, was initially decried
as an affront to Shakespeare’s masterpiece and the director was accused of sacrificing
the text for a highly stylised and bombastic shallow content. It is only recently that
this film has been viewed by critics and academics alike in a more sympathetic and
positive manner. These films, taken individually, present to us a particular
performance of the ‘Juliet’ of Shakespeare’s text; but in addition to this they allow us
a comparative study of the portrayal of Juliet as a celluloid reflection of the idealised
woman shaped by the progressive demands of the contemporary phallocentric society
in the western world. Patricia White examined this reflection theory in Feminism and
Film and, in turn, referred to the studies of Molly Haskell and Marjorie Rosen in the
early 1970s, and quoted them on the basis that film ‘reflects social reality, that
depictions of women in film mirror how society treats women, that these depictions
are distortions of how women ‘“really are” and what they “really want” ’(White 118).
The theory explores the supposition that women are repeatedly and systematically
portrayed in a catalogue of images that compels the viewer to see and accept them in a
typology of roles which, according to White, reinforces the phallocentric ideology of
women as an array of ‘virgins, vamps, victims, suffering mothers, child women and
sex kittens’(White 118). A question that therefore arises and which is central to this
thesis is how, specifically, has Juliet been portrayed in film? Has the Juliet of the
screen been nothing more than an object of visual stimulation, an object of the
scopophilic gaze and male sexual fantasy? If this is the case, how does this vary in
each of the filmed versions listed? We must also consider how Juliet exists in relation
to other characters in the play beyond her direct involvement with Romeo. Juliet’s
role is pivotal within the play even though she does not have the most lines. She has
a direct influence on Mercutio and his relationship to Romeo, even though Juliet and
Mercutio fail to exchange a single line of dialogue in the entire play. Juliet’s
relationship with Romeo is altered dramatically in the aftermath of Mercutio’s death.
Juliet’s life is also influenced by her relationships with others such as the Nurse and
Friar Laurence, each of whom will abandon her at some point in the play. How are
these relationships played and interpreted in each of the films in question? One cannot
write extensively of Juliet if one limits oneself to writing exclusively of her. Each of
these characters and how they are portrayed needs also to be examined. So too must
the directors, all male, be examined in some detail. How much do they alter the Juliet
of Shakespeare’s text and for what purpose? | en |
