SOURCE: Jorgens, Jack. “Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet.” In Romeo and Juliet: Critical Essays, edited by John F. Andrews, pp. 163-76. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1993.

In the following review, originally published in 1977, Jorgens assesses Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 film, Romeo and Juliet, commenting on its visual excessiveness, its refreshing “nontheatrical” acting, and is paring down of the original text. Jorgens concludes that while the film's action, emotional impact, and conception of theme and structure may be appealing to some viewers, the work as a whole is a more immature effort than Shakespeare's play.

Shakespeare's source for the story of Romeo and Juliet was Arthur Brooke's The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet, written first in Italian by Bandell, and now in Englishe by Ar. Br. (1562). In his “Address to the Reader,” Brooke spoke of

a couple of unfortunate lovers, thralling themselves to unhonest desire; neglecting the authority and advice...