Providence is starring in another movie. This time it's a locally-made, digitally-shot film of Romeo and Juliet, the second venture for South Main Street Productions, after their critically acclaimed Titus Andronicus (2000). Certainly one of the major draws for the hometown crowd will be the urban backdrop of the Renaissance City itself.

After opening scans of the downtown skyline and the I-195 bridge, the story begins in the empty parking lots and graffiti-ed walls of the Jewelry District, with the natural set used to great advantage. Later, the deadly fights between Mercutio and Tybalt and then between Romeo and Tybalt take place in the sandy construction site that stood between South Water Street and the river for many months, the hard metal edges of that heavy equipment framing the hot-headedness of these impulsive adolescents.

The digital camera shots, especially outdoors, sometimes seem distorted, perhaps by the wide-screen format, creating a home-movie look. Indoor scenes, however, even in low light, capture remarkable detail in close-ups. But the filmmaker's decisions about shooting tight from slightly below eye level add another odd perspective that is distracting from the actors. And the sound level wobbles, especially in the outdoor sequences.

In a conversation before last week's screening, filmmaker, director and Providence native Richard Griffin, explained why he chose Shakespeare's tale of star-crossed lovers: "I never thought it was done with intensity. People think of it as a romance, and it's actually a tragedy."

The problem in Griffin's film is that such intensity lags throughout, thereby bleaching out the tragic elements he wanted to illuminate. The basic premise for an unfolding drama is that the director and actors must make us care about the people they are portraying, so that we become involved in their feelings and their actions. But that engagement is unfortunately missing in much of this film.

The young actors who give us Romeo (Mark Mitchell Souza) and his fair Juliet (Jennifer Zigler) deliver Shakespeare's lines with clarity and crispness, but they seem to have had little direction from Griffin. Often they are merely talking heads, even in the balcony scene, where the audience yearns for gesture, nuance, perhaps a melodramatic sigh or two. Even the bedroom scene, with glimpses of nudity (the cliche of female breasts and male butt), falls flat when the teenagers argue about the lark and the nightingale.

More interesting performances are by Adam Wasserman and Robert Lamontagne as Mercutio and Benvolio. The urgency of their words is reflected in their faces, whether they are walking on a dark street or lying in the grass at India Point Park.

But the real scene-stealers are the acting professionals in the film: Dan Welch (Trinity Rep), Chris Perrotti (Sandra Feinstein-Gamm and other small theaters), and Barbara McElroy (Gamm, 2nd Story, First Stage Providence, and other small theaters). As Juliet's father, the Friar, and the Nurse, respectively, these three are clearly in a different league, offering the viewer brief moments when the tension in Shakepeare's characters comes to the fore. Welch's violent outbursts at Juliet, both verbal and physical, when she refuses to marry Paris, are compelling, dynamic; McElroy's empathy and sorrow for Juliet give necessary depth to the scenes she is in; similarly, Perrotti's furrowed brow and dark eye portend an uncertain end for the lovers whom he has joined together.

The modern-day setting, with costumes and culture to match, is effective, especially the disco club for the Capulets' party where Romeo and Juliet first meet. When Juliet falls on the knife in the tomb next to Romeo, it's not her life that flashes before her but that strobe-light-pulsing dance scene, she arm-in-arm with Paris, Romeo led away by his friends. It's a kind of visual "what if." And the closing lines are spoken alternately by Zigler and Souza.

It's that kind of imaginative invention that we crave in any new interpretation of Romeo and Juliet, especially a modern-dress one, and a film version with contemporary music intercut from the Comic Book Super Heroes, Mr. Slugg and the Legion of Doom, State of Corruption, and Devon. The gratuitous blow-job by the apothecary doesn't count. Or was that supposed to be just one more bad blow for Romeo after hearing of Juliet's death?

The trouble is, the viewer isn't invested in what happens at that point. I've seldom seen an R&J where I wasn't moved in the tomb scene, a part of me wanting to cry out to Romeo, "Kiss her first! Wake her up, like Sleeping Beauty, and you won't have to swallow the poison!" But the inevitability of the lines pulls Souza and Zigler through it, with us in tow. That's not to take away from the latent talent of these two -- it shines through here and there. But their youthful earnestness can't carry the weight of the tragedy without a firm vision and a firmer hand from the director.

Romeo and Juliet

Directed by Richard Griffin. With Mark Mitchell Souza and Jennifer Zigler, Barbara McElroy, Zoya Pierson, Chris Perrotti and Dan Welch. At the Castle Cinema Café July 26-August 1,

Issue Date: July 25 - 31, 2002