‘Juliet & Romeo’ is tragically doomed from the start
The titular lovers in Timothy Scott Bogart’s reimagined “Juliet & Romeo” aren’t just star-crossed, they’re stilted and boring, occupying a film so wrongheaded it’s hard to know where to begin chronicling its claim on worst picture of the year.
There’s plenty of blame to go around, but you can’t fault its casting directors, who’ve landed the likes of Jason Isaacs, Rupert Everett, Rebel Wilson, Derek Jacobi and Dan Fogler to fill the splashier adult roles. And as nebulous teens, Juliet and Romeo, Clara Rugaard and Jamie Ward, hold their own, despite never displaying an element of chemistry.
No, the fault lies with Bogart and the campy idea of dispensing with most of Shakespeare’s iambic pentameter and replacing it with conventional dialogue that is sung, not spoken. This might have been forgivable if the sync-pop tunes, penned by Bogart’s brother, Evan Kidd Bogart and Justin Gray, weren’t so instantly forgettable, if not downright laughable.
“West Side Story” it’s most definitely not. Heck, it’s not even in the same ballpark as Baz Luhrmann’s problematic “Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet” from 1996. At least that one lit a spark, courtesy of Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes falling in love to a soundtrack packed with popular hits of the day. This one just stumbles about in search of a reason to exist.
Shakespeare aficionados are sure to scream “blasphemy” over the significant alterations writer-director Timothy Scott Bogart has made to accommodate a planned trilogy. He should have worried more about fleshing out this installment instead of looking so far ahead. And absent that attention to detail, he’ll struggle to break even, let alone anticipate sequels. Besides, one of these torturous exercises is already one too many.
Except for the early 14th-century sets, constructed by Oscar-winner Dante Ferretti, everything about “Juliet & Romeo” screams second-rate. To begin with, the actors’ singing voices appear to have been overdubbed. Second, the songs bear a sameness in structure, with expository lyrics that elicit yawns instead of heart palpitations. And due to the likelihood of electronic enhancers, the voices are indistinguishable, creating confusion as to who’s singing at any particular moment.
At least the tunes are preferable to the blandness of the dialogue. What in the world was Bogart thinking when he convinced himself his words were more effective than Shakespeare’s? He says it’s his intent to make the Bard more “accessible” to Gen. Z. But how is he accomplishing that by erasing almost all of Shakespeare’s prose? It makes no sense. And neither would his screenplay if we didn’t know the tragic story of Romeo and Juliet so well.
Perhaps it’s that very familiarity that makes this version so dull. As a result, we’re always two or three scenes ahead. To say the film plods is an understatement. Nothing about it is engaging or romantic. It’s all perfunctory, from how the doomed lovers meet to how their warring families – the Capulets and the Montagues – will never allow the two adolescents to marry.
Oddly, Bogart begins at the ending, with the lifeless bodies of Romeo and Juliet entwined in an eternal embrace. We then skip back three days to when the two met at a street fair, without either privy to the other’s surname. We’re also introduced to Romeo’s surrogate brother, Mercutio (Nicholas Podany), and Juliet’s hot-tempered cousin, Tybalt (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo), two rivals destined for a deadly third-act confrontation. And there’s nothing Juliet’s parents, Lord (Everett) and Lady (Wilson) Capulet, or Romeo’s embittered pops, Lord Montague (Isaacs), can do about their children wanting to bump uglies.
Nor will they listen to Friar Lawrence (Jacobi), one of Romeo and Juliet’s few supporters, along with the Apothecary (Fogler), who will eventually mix up the infamous elixir guaranteed to facilitate the couple’s pursuit of happily ever after. A dozen other random characters pop in and out, but none of them with any discernible features, including the mixer, Lord Paris (Dennis Andres), and Juliet’s irrepressible Nurse (Sara Lazarro).
It’s all so haphazardly assembled, you’re ready to check out almost from the start. And the tedium only compounds with the singing of each new song. Evan Bogart possesses a Grammy for penning Beyonce’s “Halo,” but there’s nothing close to award-worthy here. Just mediocrity and wasted opportunity. See it, if you must. But me, I’d rather join Romeo and Juliet in sipping some of what they’re sipping, rather than ever again subjecting myself to this sacrilege.
Movie review
Juliet and Romeo
Rated: PG-13
Cast: Clara Rugaard, Jamie Ward, Jason Isaacs, Rupert Everett, Rupert Graves, Rebel Wilson, Dan Fogler, Derek Jacoby, Nicholas Podany and Ferdia Walsh-Peelo
Director: Timothy Scott Bogart
Writer: Timothy Scott Bogart
Runtime: 121 minutes
Where: In theaters May 9
Grade: D-
