After reading Romeo and Juliet with my students in the fourth year of Secondary Education, we watched the film West Side Story, based on the play by Shakespeare, but adapted to describe the conflicts between two rival gangs in New York in the 1950's.
The film was awarded with ten Oscars in 1961, included "Best film Award" and it was a real turning point in the hsitory of musical films. It was directed by Robert Wise and the music, famous all over the world, was written by Leonard Bernstein and the lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Jerome Robbins was in charge of the coreography and Ernest Lehman was the scipt writer.
We saw the film in English with English subtitles, but they could follow it quite well. I think they all enjoyed the film, but just to make sure I would like all of them to write a comment on the film including his/her opinion about the film but mentioning any other details like the differences with the play Romeo and Juliet, the topics on the film, the actors and actresses, the sceneries, etc...
To my students:
I would appreciate if you all sign your comments with your real names as a continuation to the debate we had in class. Thank you to you all.
I'm looking forward to reading your comments!!
I think the moovie was quite good. It was really realistic how the people hated eachother, and it made the moovie interesting. The music was great although sometimes it was difficult to understand the lyrics, and it was important to understand them. It was sometimes difficult to understand Maria's friends because of the extrange accent, but I liked the moovie.
ResponderEliminarBy: Andrea Rodríguez Hirtle 4ºA
Este comentario ha sido eliminado por el autor.
ResponderEliminarWest Side Story movie is a similar story to Romeo and Juliet.
ResponderEliminarIt has common features, including:
"There are two sides enemies and one of the members of the Latin group falls in love with a member of the other side, but this is an impossible love because their groups hate each other.
I think it is a fantastic movie because it could be a real story.There are many differences with the book, the first difference is that the story of the book takes place in the year 1400s and the films takes place in the year 1950s.
Gonzalo García Gariido. 4ºA
We are Marta Moraza and Adela García. We are going to write a comment about the film.
ResponderEliminarThe film looks like the book in the trama. The families are rivals in both cases and there is a boy and a girl in love, but in the book the lovers died and in the film the boy died but the girl didn't.
We could understand the trama well although It was in English because we saw the film with English subtitles. Sincerely, in our opinion, we didn't enjoy the film because the songs were horribles,they were old-fashioned!
We think that the film could be better if both lovers died.
West side story is about two lovers from rival families, It has a certain similarity to Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare, The story takes place in New York in the 1950's. As in Romeo and Juliet, Bernardo, Maria's brother, and rival gang leader, tries to kill Tony(Romeo in the play written by Shakespeare), but one on his gang defends his friend and Bernardo kills his friend. Tony is very angry and kills Maria's brother. One similarity in both stories is the conversation in the balcony.
ResponderEliminarIn my opinion, It's a good film because this lovers story has got a good soundtrack and a good script.
West Side Story is a film similar to the play Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare. The film has some differences with the play, for example, the story happens in New York and the play happens in Italy. There were two gangs, there weren't two families.
ResponderEliminarAlso, the film has similarities with the play, for example, the main characters met in a party, as in the play. The gangs didn't agree one with the other, as the families play.
This film was made in 950's and it was succesful for its soundtrack.
Hi! we are Carmen Ramos y Belén García. We think the book Romeo and Juliet is very different from the movie.In general, the personalities of the characters are similar to Romeo and Juliet characters, but the story is different.We don't like the dances because we think they have nothing to do with the story. Our favourite character is Maria, because her actuation is very good. The pronunciation of the latin people is very bad and we don't like that.
ResponderEliminarHelloo, I´m José Carlos Rodrigálvarez from IES Pablo Neruda. I don´t like the film a lot but the film is not bad.It´s very different from the original book. I hate the dance in the film because it´s very old-fashioned My favourite character is Maria and her boyfriend because their performances are very good.
ResponderEliminarThere are many latin people. Latin people speak in Spanish too.
In conclusion, the film is very old. In my opinion the dances are very bads.
We are Alejandro Mesonero and Jorge Parejo, we think this film was ridiculous. We didn´t understand that Maria loved Tony because he killed her brother. The film was very different from “Romeo and Juliet”. The biggest difference between Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story was the time. Romeo and Juliet was a play set in the 17th century and West Side Story was a film set in New York after the Second World War. Another difference was that in the film they danced and in the play they recited poems. Another difference was that in West Side Story there was a racism element, which there wasn't in the play. The families in Romeo and Juliet were very rich, but the people in West Side Story weren't rich. In conclusion, we didn't like West Side Story.
ResponderEliminarWest Side Story movie is very similar to Romeo and Juliet in some scenes like the scene of the balcony, the fight between their families or the Latin band in the film.
ResponderEliminarBy: Marina Dominguez
Lola Buzón
After watching the film and reading Romeo and Juliet, we think West Side Story was more real than the play, because the film is about two gangs who fight, and this situation is very common in United States.
ResponderEliminarBut talking about the relation between the play and the film , West Side Story isn't very similar to the real story because one of the most important parts in the play is the end, when the main characters die, and in this film only "Romeo" (Tony) dies.
Rocío and Irene
Hello! We are Laura and Beatriz.
ResponderEliminarThe film is about romantic teenagers.The characters, Maria(Julieta) and Tony(Romeo) lived a banned love, because Maria's family and Tony's friends were confronted.
We think the film is better than the book because in the film they dance and sing telling the story, and the book is more boring, although the book is more romantic.
One of the differences is that in the film Tony dies but Maria does not, but in the book Romeo and Juliet both die.Another difference is that in the book the families are rivals, and in the film Maria's friends are rivals again Tony's friends.
We think the book and the film are very interesting, but we like the film better.