Romeo + Juliet- The Symbolism of Water

    Baz Luhrmann's film Romeo + Juliet significantly alters many aspects of William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet, such as the substitution of guns for swords, but one of his most significant changes abounds in the profusion of water. Though the original play has few mentions of water, Luhrmann symbolically includes it in several scenes. The effect allows a modern viewer to understand, perhaps subconsciously, Shakespeare's original themes of purification, regeneration of life, distortion, and sexuality. Luhrmann visually represents meaning often derived from Shakespeare's text; he thus alleviates the necessity of understanding the heightened language that is often indomitable to modern readers.

    In the play Romeo and Juliet, the title characters first meet at a Capulet feast, and they exchange words in sonnet form, which is often dubbed the poetry of love. As they exchange verses and share a quatrain, they form a rhythmic pattern between them, finally ending in an ecstatic couplet. Shakespeare heightens this sexual structural imagery with even more language, as the characters "touch" (1.5.99) and "kiss" (1.5.96) each other. Luhrmann, however, avoids dependence upon language and uses the visual medium to communicate this sexuality. In his film, Romeo and Juliet first see each other through a fish tank. Here, the water aids the glass tank in distortion, which offers the audience an explanation for their instantaneous love, so viewers are more able to suspend their disbelief. While this tank distorts their attractiveness, the water also creates a comparable sexuality to the play's language, as water alludes to a sexual exchange of fluids. Furthermore, the two lovers slowly sashay toward the end of the fish tank, where they can finally touch each other. This dance is equivalent to the original text, where the two exchange lines to create a sonnet. Thus, the water visually represents the original sensual language.

Historically, people also have associated water with purity and regeneration. In ancient Greek mythology, many people believed Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of fertility, love, and sexuality, was born from the sea. Thus, water was seen as the primary source of life, and analysts have since related water to this idea of reproducing life. Water also became important to Christianity when Saint John the Baptist demanded people be baptized in order to repent their sins, so water became associated with a moral cleansing. This baptism allowed people to experience an inner revolution, just as Romeo and Juliet experience with their ability to love a supposed enemy and their attempt to change their families' views.

    In the play, throughout the scene in which Juliet speaks to Romeo from her window (commonly referred to as the balcony scene), the lovers speak of changing their names and reveal their own ideals of regeneration. They believe they will evade the repulsion associated with their surnames by simply changing them because the family feud has become centered on people's names rather than any actual wrongdoings. Romeo and Juliet are the purest generation--epitomized in their youth and ability to love an enemy. They attempt to recreate their familes and, in a sense, produce new life. In Luhrmann's film, Romeo and Juliet exchange these ideals in Juliet's pool rather than separated by an elevated window. Again, Luhrmann has added water to the scene. Symbolically, this water sensually exemplifies Romeo and Juliet's hope to recreate a life with their union--a life that is as pure as they are. In fact, Shakespeare's text even mentions baptism, and the purifying effect of water, when Romeo tells Juliet to "call [him] but love, and [he'll] be new baptiz'd" (2.2.50).

    In addition to purity and regeneration, the wetness of this scene celebrates the sexuality of Shakespeare's language. In the original text, Juliet asks Romeo, "What's Montague? It is nor hand nor foot, nor arm, nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man" (2.2.40-2). Here, Shakespeare subtly makes a phallic reference. Additionally, when Juliet leaves, Romeo asks her why she will "leave [him] so unsatisfied" (2.2.125), which is a reference to sexual satisfaction, to which she later responds that "all [her] fortunes at [his] foot [she'll] lay" (2.2.147) after marriage. Luhrmann's transformation of this scene salutes Shakespeare's thematic expressions of sexuality, purity, and regeneration.

    Though Romeo and Juliet are able to surpass their families' hatred in defnese of their love, Tybalt, of the same generation, never even considers the Montagues' humanity, even when his uncle admits that "Verona brags of [Romeo] to be a virtuous and well-governed youth" (1.5.66-7). Instead, Tybalt imitates his family's precedents and eventually murders a virtual stranger, so he represents the inevitable recurrence of hatred in his generation. Those around him, such as Romeo, Juliet, and Benvolio, are trying to recreate life and escape their families' feud, but Tybalt thwarts their attempts. When he tries to fight Romeo, shortly after Romeo and Juliet's wedding, Romeo uses only kind words toward Tybalt to try to express his care; he calls Tybalt "good Capulet" (3.1.71), in the same manner that he refers to his best friend as "gentle Mercutio" (3.1.84), and he tells him that he "[loves him]"(3.1.69). However, when Tybalt murders Mercutio, he corrupts Romeo and finally forces him to feel the hatred of the previous generation. Romeo acknowledges this corruption when he states that his "reputation [is] stain'd with Tybalt's slander" (3.1.111-2). In the film, Luhrmann represents all of this with his slow motion cinematography that focuses on Tybalt's death. When Romeo shoots Tybalt, his dead body plunges into a fountain, and his blood contaminates the clean water, much as his obstinate hatred has infected the peers of his generation who have been advocating change. Despite Romeo and Juliet's attempts, fate, combined with Tybalt's stubbornness and ignorance, has continued to impede change.

    Romeo has briefly strayed from his pure ideals, but his repentance induces his forgiveness. In the original text, after Romeo slays Tybalt, he cries that "[he is] fortune's fool" (3.1.136). This statement immediately evokes pity from the audience. As the entire play insinuates that those of Romeo's generation are victims of fate, and that they have no ability to overcome their parents' follies, Romeo's acknowledgement and willingness to feel sorrow for his justifiable deed reestablishes his purity. By forgiving Romeo, which the text also accomplishes through Juliet's mercy, Shakespeare suggests repentance is possible, and perhaps encouraged. In the film, Romeo's astonished and regretful facial expression is obvious, and Luhrmann communicates its importance with a twenty-second close up of it. This achieves the same goal as the text in eliciting a compassionate response from the viewer. Throughout the chase and fight scene in the film, a violent storm threatens the characters with its drak clouds and thunder. However, the rain never falls until Tybalt's death. In fact, the camera focuses on a shot of the gun when the rain begins to pour, as if the rain, in the form of a baptism, is washing away its sins. Though the film retains the idea of forgiveness after repentance, it concentrates on extracting this meaning from the inclusion of water rather than solely from language.

    In effect, Luhrmann enhances Shakespeare's language through his exploitation of a visual medium. With water, he creates the same message as Shakespeare without such a reliance on understanding every bit of the language. This is important and effective to a modern audience because many people feel distanced and confused by Shakespeare's language. Thus, Luhrmann recreates Shakespeare's words and transforms them to images that evoke the same emotions and responses in his viewers as in Shakespeare's contemporary audiences.