“The Twilight Saga: New Moon” Review: Vampires, Werewolves, and Bad Acting, Oh My!
After the lights dimmed to a chorus of shrieks from the tween girls that had piled into the theater no less than five hours before the midnight showing of “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”, I came to the conclusion that I wanted my $12.50 back.
The entirely-too-long graphic of a moon waning until it was a narrow sliver, revealing the title of the movie was merely a hint at the horrors to come. What ensued was a dragged out rendering of what was a weak and poorly written story to begin with. Protagonist Bella Swan, whose poor taste in men is rivaled by none. is hopelessly in love with 104 –year-old “vegetarian” vampire Edward Cullen. He thinks he is too dangerous for her, so he tells her he doesn’t love her anymore and departs to keep her safe. Bella sinks into a depression that is ridiculous for someone who has been in a relationship for only six months, illustrated by dizzying camera shot which revolves around a listless Bella, seated and staring out the window, behind which the seasons change, in apathy. This depression includes fits of nightmares and screaming in her sleep, to the dismay of her father.
Then, Bella discovers landing herself in ludicrously perilous situations triggers hallucinations of her departed boyfriend, and becomes “an adrenaline junkie”. She becomes close friends with Jacob Black, who as luck would have it is a werewolf. Why wouldn’t he be? I was just surprised that none of her other human friends spontaneously became goblins. Because, naturally, nobody seems capable of surviving without Bella, when Edward learns of an adrenaline-seeking episode of cliff diving and believes her dead, he runs off to provoke the ire of the Volturi, the Italian vampires that constitute the royal family of the vampire world, in hopes that they will kill him. His adopted sister rushes to bring Bella to Italy so that a glimpse of her, alive, will deter him from his plan to commit suicide by proxy. She arrives just in time, and after an all-too-brief brush with the Volturi, Bella is home again, having completely forgiven Edward, and puts her mortality up for a vote. The family votes to eventually make her one of them.
To my great relief, director Chris Weitz replaced the eccentric Catherine Hardwicke of “Twilight”. Although that was a great improvement, Weitz’s limited exposure to CGI in “The Golden Compass” did little to prepare him for realistic looking werewolves. The car-sized creatures looked absurd. And speaking of cars, none could miss Volvo’s feature crossover, which, to my great amusement, appeared along with its driver in some of Bella’s hallucinations. This is daring even for a product placement attempt.
Unfortunately, although the director was much improved in this sequel, no such thing can be said for the actors, especially the lead femme, Kristen Stewart (Bella Swan). Her relentless monotone, severe difficulty with eye contact, strange and excessive blinking, and laughable attempts at delivering cringe-worthy lines with feeling were painful to watch. Robert Pattinson (Edward Cullen), although apparently a talented actor in other works, seems irritated with this über-sensitive, lipstick-covered role. Michael Sheen was fantastic in his role as the decades-old Aro, leader of the Volturi. Dakota Fanning, in oversized red contact lenses, was disappointing, and appeared very briefly. Taylor Lautner (Jacob Black), shirtless from very early on, remained so for about 7/8ths of the movie. Although his new physique was impressive, he looked awkward and unused to his newly acquired bulky torso.
There were other characters, but they are not worth mentioning, as they were apparently not important enough to even warrant move that a cumulative few minutes of screen time. The movie suffered greatly from the lack of chemistry between Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart in the few moments the actor shared, but suffered even more from Edward’s absence for the large part of the film.
Aside from the pretentious titling of the movie “The Twilight Saga”, other displays of arrogance the movie included were relentless uses of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet designed to suggest that Stephenie Meyer’s story is Shakespeare-caliber. Overall, this movie will satisfy hardcore fans of the series, but is off putting to outsiders or critics of the books because it is relentlessly depressing, melodramatic, and cheesy. The makeup artists created distracting effects, the dialogue cringe-inducing, the CGI just marginally better than “Twilight”. It’s impressive, really, and to his credit, that Robert Pattinson didn’t burst into hysterical laughter when Kristen Stewart shouted at him to take her soul when his character tried to break up with her. Or maybe he did. We’ll have to eagerly await the DVD release and check the blooper reel to find out.
After the lights dimmed to a chorus of shrieks from the tween girls that had piled into the theater no less than five hours before the midnight showing of “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”, I came to the conclusion that I wanted my $12.50 back.
The entirely-too-long graphic of a moon waning until it was a narrow sliver, revealing the title of the movie was merely a hint at the horrors to come. What ensued was a dragged out rendering of what was a weak and poorly written story to begin with. Protagonist Bella Swan, whose poor taste in men is rivaled by none. is hopelessly in love with 104 –year-old “vegetarian” vampire Edward Cullen. He thinks he is too dangerous for her, so he tells her he doesn’t love her anymore and departs to keep her safe. Bella sinks into a depression that is ridiculous for someone who has been in a relationship for only six months, illustrated by dizzying camera shot which revolves around a listless Bella, seated and staring out the window, behind which the seasons change, in apathy. This depression includes fits of nightmares and screaming in her sleep, to the dismay of her father.
Then, Bella discovers landing herself in ludicrously perilous situations triggers hallucinations of her departed boyfriend, and becomes “an adrenaline junkie”. She becomes close friends with Jacob Black, who as luck would have it is a werewolf. Why wouldn’t he be? I was just surprised that none of her other human friends spontaneously became goblins. Because, naturally, nobody seems capable of surviving without Bella, when Edward learns of an adrenaline-seeking episode of cliff diving and believes her dead, he runs off to provoke the ire of the Volturi, the Italian vampires that constitute the royal family of the vampire world, in hopes that they will kill him. His adopted sister rushes to bring Bella to Italy so that a glimpse of her, alive, will deter him from his plan to commit suicide by proxy. She arrives just in time, and after an all-too-brief brush with the Volturi, Bella is home again, having completely forgiven Edward, and puts her mortality up for a vote. The family votes to eventually make her one of them.
To my great relief, director Chris Weitz replaced the eccentric Catherine Hardwicke of “Twilight”. Although that was a great improvement, Weitz’s limited exposure to CGI in “The Golden Compass” did little to prepare him for realistic looking werewolves. The car-sized creatures looked absurd. And speaking of cars, none could miss Volvo’s feature crossover, which, to my great amusement, appeared along with its driver in some of Bella’s hallucinations. This is daring even for a product placement attempt.
Unfortunately, although the director was much improved in this sequel, no such thing can be said for the actors, especially the lead femme, Kristen Stewart (Bella Swan). Her relentless monotone, severe difficulty with eye contact, strange and excessive blinking, and laughable attempts at delivering cringe-worthy lines with feeling were painful to watch. Robert Pattinson (Edward Cullen), although apparently a talented actor in other works, seems irritated with this über-sensitive, lipstick-covered role. Michael Sheen was fantastic in his role as the decades-old Aro, leader of the Volturi. Dakota Fanning, in oversized red contact lenses, was disappointing, and appeared very briefly. Taylor Lautner (Jacob Black), shirtless from very early on, remained so for about 7/8ths of the movie. Although his new physique was impressive, he looked awkward and unused to his newly acquired bulky torso.
There were other characters, but they are not worth mentioning, as they were apparently not important enough to even warrant move that a cumulative few minutes of screen time. The movie suffered greatly from the lack of chemistry between Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart in the few moments the actor shared, but suffered even more from Edward’s absence for the large part of the film.
Aside from the pretentious titling of the movie “The Twilight Saga”, other displays of arrogance the movie included were relentless uses of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet designed to suggest that Stephenie Meyer’s story is Shakespeare-caliber. Overall, this movie will satisfy hardcore fans of the series, but is off putting to outsiders or critics of the books because it is relentlessly depressing, melodramatic, and cheesy. The makeup artists created distracting effects, the dialogue cringe-inducing, the CGI just marginally better than “Twilight”. It’s impressive, really, and to his credit, that Robert Pattinson didn’t burst into hysterical laughter when Kristen Stewart shouted at him to take her soul when his character tried to break up with her. Or maybe he did. We’ll have to eagerly await the DVD release and check the blooper reel to find out.
Robkingett
swim4ever
E.L.W.
EdytD
Prophet92
Join the Discussion
This article has 16 comments. Post your own!