Romeo + Juliet

Romeo + Juliet (1996) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more.

This latest version of the bard's classic play is set in an urban jungle ruled by warring gang families.

Is Romeo + Juliet OK for your child? Read Common Sense Media's movie review to help you make informed decisions.

Romeo + Juliet summary of box office results, charts and release information and related links.

Skinheads, drag queens, and leather-boy desperadoes. Silver designer pistols that look as if they were engraved at a Rodeo Drive boutique. Gunfights and brawls edited with such whiplash abandon the images might have been cut together by a straight razor â?¦ William Shakespeareâ??s Romeo and Juliet is a slick blast of â?decadence,â? the kind of violent swank-trash music video that may make you feel like reaching for the remote control. The movieâ??s young stars, Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes, are downy-skinned teen idols with matching curlicue smiles.

Baz Luhrmann's dazzling and unconventional adaptation of William Shakespeare's classic love story is spellbinding. Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes portray Romeo and Juliet, the youthful star-crossed lovers of the past who now meet in the futuristic urban backdrop of Verona Beach. Their two rival families, the Montaques and the Capulets, are now gangs and every other aspect of life surrounding Romeo and Juliet's tragic love affair has moved from its Elizabethan origins to a decidedly contemporary, brilliantly stylized reality.

No doubt the most aggressively modern, assertively trendy adaptations of Shakespeare ever filmed, this overwhelmingly of-the-moment version of one of literature's most enduring tragic love stories can serve as a litmus test for any viewer's willingness to accept extreme stylistic attitudinizing as a substitute for the virtues of traditional storytelling.

I've seen Shakespeare done in drag. I've seen Richard III as a Nazi. I've seen 'The Tempest' as science fiction and as a Greek travelogue. I've seen Prince Hal and Falstaff as homosexuals in Portland.

Critics Consensus: Baz Luhrmann's visual aesthetic is as divisive as it is fresh and inventive.

Leonardo Dicaprio is 21, Claire Danes is 17, and, yes, class, they do get naked in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. You almost laugh watching them put a hip, hotblooded spin on the Bard's star-crossed lovers. No dis intended. The laughter comes from delight and awe at how well DiCaprio and Danes pull off the trick. These babes from the TV woods â?? he started in Growing Pains; she emerged in My So--Called Life â?? fill their classic roles with vital passion, speak the Elizabethan verse with unforced grace, find the spirited comedy of the play without losing its tragic fervor and keep their balance when the audacious Australian director Baz Luhrmann (Strictly Ballroom) hurls them into a whirlwind of hardball action, rowdy humor and rapturous romance.

this is the trailer to Romeo + Juliet possibly one of the best movies ever. enjoy. I DO NOT OWN ANY OF THESE CLIPS, ALL CLIPS BELONG TO THEIR OWNERS

Directed by Baz Luhrmann. With Leonardo DiCaprio, Claire Danes, John Leguizamo, Harold Perrineau. Shakespeare's famous play is updated to the hip modern suburb of Verona still retaining its original dialogue.

Romeo + Juliet is a 1996 American romantic drama film adaptation of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. It was directed by Baz Luhrmann. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes in the leading roles. The film is an abridged modernization of Shakespeare's play. While it retains the original Shakespearean dialogue, the Montagues and the Capulets are represented as warring mafia empires (with legitimate business fronts) and swords are replaced with guns (with brand names such as "Dagger" and "Sword").