This is partly due to the director’s comfort with Shakespeare’s writing - he’d filmed the Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton Taming of the Shrew the year before - but any Romeo and Juliet is only as good as its leads, and Zeffirelli had a terrific pair in Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey not only were they age-appropriate (Whiting was 18, Hussey 15), but they carried the material as deftly as seasoned pros, and their powerful chemistry helped sweep audiences into the world’s most famous tale of star-crossed love all over again.
Though he was far from the first director to adapt Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet for the big screen, Franco Zeffirelli is one of the most successful in fact, before Baz Luhrmann released Romeo + Juliet in 1996, Zeffirelli’s film was arguably the one most people thought of when they tried to imagine a living, breathing version of the Bard’s Verona. How many film romances can be held up as not only affecting, but legitimately important?
It’s decidedly dramatic stuff, and their performances were compelling enough to transcend what had previously been one of Hollywood’s mainstream sexual taboos. As Ennis and Jack, Ledger and Gyllenhaal were given a lot to deal with - not only did their characters have to bear the weight of overwhelming prejudice, but they were both married with children. Give credit to Annie Proulx, then, for writing Brokeback Mountain, a short story that followed the tortured path of the decidedly non-platonic love between two Wyoming ranch hands - and credit to Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal for stepping into the roles and giving the film the kind of box-office clout that leads to Academy Awards and almost $200 million in worldwide grosses. We’ve got a lot of star-crossed lovers on our list, and they represent only a tiny fraction of the many circuitous love stories that have unfolded in the cinema - so you know that by 2005, just about every variation on the theme had been played out at a theater near you. Take the anguish you felt, multiply it by a factor of several dozen, and you’ve got the thorny dilemma at the heart of Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain. (Plus, Julian Sands is in the movie, and things are always weird when that guy’s around.) All the same, anyone who’s ever felt the pull of an unhealthy bond, or willfully turned away from the promise of salvation, can understand Leaving Las Vegas.Įnnis del Mar and Jack Twist ( Brokeback Mountain)Ĭhances are that at some point in your life, you’ve developed feelings for someone you didn’t think you should love.
It’s undeniably one of the stranger relationships on our list, one whose love - if love can be said to be a motivator at all - is sublimated so strenuously that it manifests itself in dark, unpleasant ways.
#STARCROSSED 1985 ROTTEN TOMATOES MOVIE#
As unemployed Hollywood agent Ben Sanderson, Cage spent Leaving Las Vegas caught between two relationships - his budding feelings for a hooker with a heart of gold (played by Elisabeth Shue), and his long-standing relationship with the bottle - and although the movie telegraphed its ending from the earliest moments of the final act, Cage and Shue’s tender, world-weary interplay kept audiences invested until its heartbreaking final moments. The next time you’re watching one of Nicolas Cage’s ill-advised big-budget action capers through splayed fingers, just remember: Once upon a time, he was one-third of one of the most heartbreaking filmic love triangles of the ’90s. Let’s just say that it’s difficult for a relationship to come up roses when your significant other is pushing up daisies.īen Sanderson and Sera ( Leaving Las Vegas) If you thought relationships were hard enough to begin with, try imagining that Whoopi Goldberg is actually Patrick Swayze and engaging in a session of heavy petting with her/him. When Sam is unexpectedly shot and killed one night, he begins his (after)life as a ghost, following Molly around like a lost puppy and trying desperately to communicate the three words he had so much trouble uttering when he was alive: “I love you.” He’s unfortunate enough to witness all kinds of shenanigans on the part of his best bud Carl (Tony Goldwyn), who may or may not be linked to Sam’s death, and ultimately resorts to communicating with Molly through a neurotic psychic (Whoopi Goldberg). You never know what you’ve got ’til… you’re gone? Sam Wheat (Patrick Swayze) always had a problem expressing how he truly felt about his girlfriend, Molly (Demi Moore), which, to most outsiders, would seem ludicrous, since Molly is smoking hot.
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