original print: 12/16/08
How the movie Twilight has managed to make over $30 million for its opening day is baffling, but the fact that it has made over $150 million in the last three weeks, I find just disheartening. There is no other way to say it; Twilight is a god awful sorry excuse for a movie. This movie is awful.Last year I wrote an article about Two Girls One Cup, and had to watch the shock video twice, I watched it both times without getting up- I had to walk out of Twilight twice just to keep myself from attacking the screen.
That pretty much means my tolerance for scat eating lesbians throwing up feces on each other was higher than it was for this stoic, drab insult to women's intelligence.
Twilight, which opened Nov. 21, is the teenaged "love" story of Bella Swan, the town sheriff's daughter and a local vampire pretty boy, Edward Cullen. The movie is based on the four book series by Stephanie Meyer.
I would usually advise to read the book, but they too are terrible.
You can't quite call it a vampire love story mainly because all supernatural elements of the story take a back seat to adolescence self importance and babbling about how special and great the two main characters are.
What this movie really consists of is two pale brunettes staring at each other with their mouths open for over 90mins.
There really isn't a love story either, about 10 minutes after meeting Edward, Bella wakes up and announces that she's in love with him.
Literally, she rolls out of bed , makes a short soliloquy about how much she can't stop thinking about him, and BAM- she's in love.
Its frustrating watching this, because the writer of the movie, has written several episodes of the hit show Dexter, a smart witty and sometimes gruesome show about the worlds most lovable serial killer. I kept asking myself where did all that talent go? In all honesty you have to remember that an adaptation can only be as good as it's source material, and comparatively the writer of the movie made Bella a much less offensive character.
The book has Bella more of a self-loathing ugly duckling and Edward, well he's still as much of a creepy stalker as he is in the book, but most of Edward watching Bella sleep at night was thankfully cut. The movie version of Bella opted to have her have no personality at all than have her be pathetic.
This is no Romeo and Juliet, Twilight lacks the bite of conflict. Sure Bella is a human, and Edward is a vampire, but he's a vegetarian vampire…he doesn't eat people. Note to the author of twilight- Deer are not vegetables as they are made of meat.
The reason that Edward doesn't want to go into the sunlight, spontaneous (awesome) combustion?
Nope, the reason is he'll sparkle like stripper that went overboard on the Fredrick's of Hollywood body dust.
Bella is the new girl at school did she feel like an awkward outcast? No,everyone instantly loves her, Edward's family instantly loves her, there's absolutely nothing to keep one invested in the cardboard problem free characters.
The first set of characters we meet are the children at Bella's school, they are all stock characters, the geeks, the pretty popular girls and the dumb jock , the all American stud. The second group are the Cullen's Edward's beautiful incestuous family.
They all seem to serve the purpose to tell the viewer that they love Bella, and we should accept that she's lovable even though she's given us no reason to care about her.
Bella's multi-culture pals were white in Meyer's book; the casting director decided that throwing in some minorities would liven up the film. I'm all for multi-ethnic casts, but when the dumb jock is the only black man in the movie, and the only two Asians are "nerds" you have to ask what was the point. Why not just stay at stereotypes without upgrading to racism.
This is most uncomfortable when the dumb jock loses control of his car and almost kills Bella in the school parking lot, of course her vampiric love is there to save the day, Bella is not harmed.
The Jock driving has a bleeding head wound and as he hangs out of the smoking car all he can do is apologize to Bella, as those around him scream and admonish him for almost hurting her.
The next scene is in a hospital where Bella is getting the attention of nurses; the bleeding black man is sitting alone, and then is told by Bella's father that he's losing his license.
My movie-watching companion made a joke that there was probably a deleted cross-burning scene, I laughed but I have to admit it would have fit seamlessly.
I'm sure it would be a close up of Bella long black hair blowing in the wind as the sheriff's department drag the jock out of his house and stomp on him, blurred in the background. If they can have vampires playing baseball why not, right?
The last 30 minutes of the movie is the only part of the movie with an attempt at conflict. Three bad vampires show up during a baseball game, yes you read that correctly.
For no reason other than to fill time one of the vampires wants to eat Bella.
This results in Edward trying to take Bella against her will to "protect her". This is also the point were I realize that this love story is one backhand away from being a Lifetime channel movie.
The Cullens try to save Bella, because they love her for no good reason. The bad vampire beats the crap out of her , which I have to admit was strangely satisfying to watch.
The good vampires rip him to pieces and set him on fire. Sounds awesome right? WRONG, You don't get to see it!
While the bad guy is getting dismembered the camera doesn't focus on this, it focuses on Bella and Edward staring at each other, because that the director felt was more interesting than a dismembered dude on fire.
Well, Catherine Hardwicke it's not.
Twilight is a horrible movie, made from a horrible book. The fact that people are giving this movie a pass because it was made for teenaged girls should be an insult to women everywhere.
© Copyright 2009 Observer
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