Andrzej Bartkowiak’s Romeo Must Die (2000) might seem like an odd fusion today: based, very loosely, on Romeo and Juliet, and informed by both kung-fu cinema and hip-hop. But from the vantage of the period in which it was made, it’s not so much an anomaly as a maybe inevitable lovechild of some cinematic trends then in vogue. Reimaginings of classic, often Shakesperean texts were common, their stories typically enlivened by young and sexy actors decent to great at persuasively making the case for a well-worn source material’s timelessness. And hip-hop, as well as some of the most definitive stars of Hong Kong’s recently booming action-movie output, were making progressively bigger strides in American cinema, as noted in an excellent 2021 retrospective of Romeo Must Die from critic Beatrice Loayza.
The movie is an uneasy product. But it’s fascinating to watch, largely because it marked the first Hollywood feature to star martial-arts great Jet Li, who didn’t speak any English when production began, and was the movie debut of the late Aaliyah, who was attempting to use the cachet she’d amassed as a singer to launch an acting career she’d soon be robbed of the chance to really capitalize on.
Li and Aaliyah are the film’s Romeo and Juliet, though their relationship is unexpectedly free of romance: it’s more of a partnership with flirtatious flashes that slowly diminish in tandem with the film’s rising stakes. They’re the progeny of warring crime families in Oakland, whose long-running rivalry takes a nasty turn at the beginning of the movie when the youngest son of the Chinese Triad’s boss is brutally murdered after casually hanging out at a nightclub widely considered one of the enemy’s. Aaliyah plays a young woman named Trish who makes it a point to distance herself from her father’s (Delroy Lindo) dealings, making money on her own working at a clothing store-cum-coffee shop that often jointly serves as a hangout for local youths. Li plays Han, a former cop and older brother of the deceased who escapes prison to investigate what’s happened.
Aaliyah and Jet Li in Romeo Must Die.
Trish and Han become unlikely allies when she happens to hail the cab he’s stolen as a de-facto getaway car. They both want to put an end to the bloodshed for which their parents, and the scaffolding of minions they’ve mounted over the years, are responsible. Neither would say they have any particular allegiance — only the peace they’re chasing after.
The stakes are high. But Romeo Must Die is chronically undermined by puzzling frictionlessness, further dulled by the murkiness with which the business dealings of the rival crime families are written and its unwieldy tonal command. The movie will go from Godfather-lite graveness to slapstick — usually on account of something a babyfaced Anthony Anderson, ostensibly in the cast to provide about five people’s worth of comic relief — that clouds whether the movie wants to be seen as serious or pulpily tinged with amusing cartoonishness.
Some of that cartoonishness comes from the action sequences. They’re performed with the same cheeky, gravity-optional acrobaticness associated with the Hong Kong action cinema that is, thankfully, generously invoked by Bartkowiak. (A highlight: Li schooling some young men from the rival gang in a game of scrimmage simply by innovatively repurposing the martial-arts skills he’d accumulated overseas.) Romeo Must Die is most fun as a showcase for Aaliyah, who for the most part smoothly translates the cool charisma of her musical image into her inchoate film career, when it isn’t for Li. He’s leaden, obviously saddled by fish-out-of-water discomfort, when in scenes where he’s not engaged in combat. But when he is, Romeo Must Die hums with life. Not much about the movie is particularly persuasive, but in the sporadic moments where Li is unequivocally in his element, you go from ambivalent to enthusiastic in an instant.
Peterson Reviews 