Blu-ray Review - Tromeo And Juliet (1996)

It’s hard to fathom that the same guy directed Tromeo And Juliet nearly 20 years later would make one of the biggest blockbusters in recent years Guardians of the Galaxy. Troma head houncho Lloyd Kaufman may be credited as the sole director but it’s equally comes from the twisted mind of James Gunn who was an uncredited director. The film as the title suggests is loosely based on the Bard’s famous play of star-crossed lovers.

Motörhead’s Lemmy overseas the proceedings as the film’s narrator and for the most part follows the play fairly faithfully. Obviously given it’s a Troma production there are loads of gore and sex and all that kind of fun stuff. The biggest deviation from the play besides obviously language differences is that the tragic ending is changed drastically.

The acting is Troma films are never their strong point and that’s just a kind way of saying it has deliberately awful acting to fit within the campy nature of the films they make. Naturally with Troma there is some casual crossdressing and lesbianism which prevails through everything they’ve done. It suffers from being terribly paced which also is problematic for another Troma film The Toxic Avenger Part II, with campy B-Movies if it goes over 90 minutes you desperately need to make something that transcends the genre and Troma never strives to do that so they suffer.

Tromeo & Juliet remains nearly 20 years since its little release a curiosity in the development of James Gunn who is now one of the “hottest” directors in Hollywood after the gigantic success of Guardians of the Galaxy. It however is baggy and all over the place and the film’s best jokes are about a Paedophile priest. The film also lacks what could have been a great gross out suicide in the climax but instead changes the iconic ending.

88 Films who specialise in B-Movies of various kinds has released the film in two different aspect ratios Full-Screen or Widescreen. The disc also includes commentaries by Lloyd Kaufman and James Gunn amongst others along with deleted scenes and rehearsal footage.

[rating=2]

Ian Schultz