How did I make it to 2024 without ever seeing a single Twilight film? Well, they weren’t geared towards me as a viewer obviously (I was a 28-year-old guy when the first film came out in 2008), so I blew them off. I discounted the actors too, and it wasn’t until years later that I realized that both Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson are actually quite good actors. So, I thought I’d see what all the hype was about. Having read plenty of good and bad reviews online over the years, I sort of knew what to expect. The film follows a teen named Bella Swan who goes to live with her single father after her mother marries a minor league baseball player and goes on the road with him. In Bella’s new town in the far northwest, which never sees sun with all the rain, she finds a set of new friends fairly easily, but it is the loner Edward Cullen who draws her eye the most. His brooding demeanor oozes hotness, but he doesn’t reciprocate Bella’s attention, at least at first. As Bella gets to know him though, and he starts to open up, she realizes something is wrong about him. Turns out, you guessed, Edward (and his entire family) are immortal vampires. The family call themselves “vegetarian” vampires though, living off animals instead of human blood, but when a rival trio of vampires come through the area and one of them is intoxicated by Bella’s blood, Edward’s family decides to defend her for Edward’s sake, who has finally decided he loves her. Super cheesy teen drama (the music/soundtrack makes it even worse), the direction is subpar at best, and the editing is roughshod throughout, but putting production aside, the film is actually pretty good. I was into it anyway, for a new take on the whole star-crossed lovers theme. In this particular film, Pattinson has a way to go, but Stewart is already showing signs of what she will become. ★★★½
New Moon, unfortunately, is about what I was expecting from the series, and that’s not a good thing. Since his presence has put Bella’s life in danger, Edward decides to leave, and it is time for his family to move on anyway (since they don’t age, they can never stay in one school too long). In his absence, Bella starts growing closer to Jacob Black, a Native American who hints that his tribe have been at odds with the Cullens for generations. To make this series even better (?), Jacob and his tribe are werewolves, or at least, some are, as it is a gene that some get and some don’t. They and the Cullens, traditionally rivals, made a pact hundreds of years ago that they would keep a truce as long as the Cullens didn’t feast on humans in the area, a promise that has been kept. Now though, Bella and Edward are in love, and she is not wanting to age and die as he continues on as a young immortal. She wants to become a vampire, but in doing so, it would break the peace between the two groups. Not nearly as exciting as the first movie, the only real redeeming quality is the expansion of the lore of the families in the area. Jacob as a rival to Edward is just lame from the beginning, but we’ll see where this goes. ★½
Eclipse is… fantastic! Maybe it was lowered expectations after New Moon, but this movie blew me away. The sole living vampire of the trio in the first film, Victoria, has vowed revenge on Edward in the way that will hurt him most: killing Bella. To that end, she is building an army of vampires in nearby Seattle. By the time Edward and his family get wind of it, Victoria’s army is too large for them to handle on their own. They seek help from the most unlikely of sources: Jacob and his werewolf clan. For the good of the area, the werewolves agree to help, and they together hatch a plan to win the day. Also going on is, of course, Bella’s love life. She and Edward have agreed to be married after upcoming graduation, but Bella can’t help but admit that she has feelings for Jacob too, and Jacob isn’t willing to let her go so easy. Outstanding action and romance, with very dire consequences for the losers (of both the battle and the love!), I thought the movie was great. There’s even a good setup (which hopefully pans out in the final 2 films) where the Volturi, the head vampires who make the laws that all others are supposed to follow, show their cards that they aren’t happy with the way Edward’s clan has been carrying on. ★★★★½
Forget 1 step forward, 2 steps back. Breaking Dawn Part 1 is more like a couple steps forward, then turning around and walking a mile in the other direction. All of the build-up and tension and emotional energy from the last movie is gone. All we have left is CW-like teen drama about Bella getting married (30 minutes of longing looks and tender touching) followed by sexy vampire love on their honeymoon, where Bella gets pregnant unexpectedly, and the baby growing insider her at an exponential rate. This goes on for a solid hour. It’s the worst kind of teen who-gives-a-shit flick. And man oh man, when Jacob loses his shit when the unborn baby starts killing Bella, and he and the wolves gather and start talking in “wolf voices,” I almost turned it off. It’s beyond silly, it’s just bad. Terrible acting, atrocious dialogue… it really can’t be any worse. I followed through to the end, mainly just wanting to see how it ended and hoping (maybe vainly) that they can capture the magic of the last film and that the finale can deliver. ½
The finale is a bit better, even if doesn’t hit the heights that I would have liked. After 30 solid minutes of sappy love and Bella getting used to her new vampire body/powers, and coming to terms with her daughter Renesmee, who has a serious case of SORAS, we get into the nitty gritty. The Cullens hear wind that the Volturi will be coming for the child, thinking that she is a vampire too. It is forbidden to turn children into vampires; because they can’t be taught to control their hunger, in centuries past, child vampires would wipe out whole villages and thus cause humans to rise up against them. Edward and his family don’t think the Volturi will believe that Renesmee isn’t really a vampire, so they start bringing in friendly vampires the world around who will act as witnesses to try to talk the Volturi from their mission. Jacob gets all his werewolf pals in to help too, in case there is a battle. Of course the whole thing is leading to the fight, which is pretty good (even if the writers do cop out in the end with a bit of a “twist”). All in all, I was satisfied I guess. I can certainly see why, if I were a teenage girl when these books/movies were coming out, I could be in to them, with the romance and all that. Not my market, so as a whole the series (for me) had a couple highs, some really low lows, and overall was just about average. ★★½
- TV series recently watched: The Wheel of Time (season 2), The Diplomat (season 1), Reacher (season 2)
- Book currently reading: Dragons of a Fallen Sun by Weis & Hickman
Jons Movie Takes 