THE TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN - PART 1.

There's really only 4 reasons somebody is seeing this movie: 1) You're a fan of the series, 2) You're being dragged by a significant other who is a fan of the series, 3) You realize this series is terrible and love to laugh at it, or 4) plain morbid curiosity. As most of you know by now, I'm a mixture of the last two. In this one, Bella (Kristen Stewart) married vampire Edward (Robert Pattinson), she gets pregnant, and everyone, including werewolf Jacob (Taylor Lautner), gets in a huff because the baby starts to kill her from the inside.

Of the primary two male leads, I've always been a "Team Jacob" person. He tends to treat her well, generally respect her wishes (even if he hates them), love her unconditionally, and fight for her until the very end. Edward, on the other hand, is mopey, boring, mean, controlling, and has way too many stalker/serial killer tendencies. He really tops it off in this one, where he treats Bella as if her feelings and opinions don't matter (and then accuses her of not including him). Not to mention Bella always seems like it pains her to be with him, while she always laughs, feels good, and even says she feels "complete" with Jacob. The Edward relationship has always felt forced, and it makes Bella seem like an even worse person than she already is by treating Jacob the way she does.

Nothing in these stories makes any sense. Everything contradicts itself, and nothing these characters do is logical. And this movie, yet again, proves that all of the other characters besides the main three are far more interesting. From the rest of the Cullen siblings to Charlie to Seth to the 5 minutes of screen time we see Bella's old high school friends. They were all far more entertaining than the primary story.

The acting, however, has quite improved, especially since the first film. Kristen Stewart still needs to learn how to smile during the most important moments of her life, though. Even Edward gives a grin here and there. Surprisingly, Taylor Lautner doesn't act with his abs in this movie. Literally the first shot in this movie is him taking off his shirt, but after that... he tends to keep it on for pretty much the remainder of the film. Sorry, ladies. The one person I do want to give it up to here is Jackson Rathbone as Jasper. He might have only had about 3 minutes of screen time in this entire film (and that's stretching it), but he showed more charm and personality in those 3 minutes than he has for the past 3 films combined. Oh yeah, and Billy Burke's Charlie is still the best character in this entire thing.

What brings these films down is, of course, the writing. But you can't really blame screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg, though. It all goes back to the source material. In fact, I've always said that the films are better than the books because at least you don't have to read Stephenie Meyer's terrible writing and how godly Edward's breath is every other sentence. And actually, Melissa Rosenberg tends to be in on the joke with the audience, putting in little quips here and there that make fun of the material. In the last film it was about Jacob's shirtlessness. In this one, it was toward how terrible the name Renesmee is. There was actually a surprising amount of humor in this movie, and I don't just mean the unintentional kind. I also must thank our dear screenwriter yet again for adding in an action sequence where the book skipped over it.

As for my opinion on the seemingly much-talked-about "pack mind" sequence? I'll just say it worked much better in the book. The telepathic talking between the wolves was silly, but it would have been silly no matter how they translated it onto the screen. The Jacob section of the book was arguably the best and/or only good thing in the entire 800 (or however many) pages. It didn't translate nearly as well to the screen.

Finally, I want to discuss the visuals. As usual, the CGI is rather questionable, especially Renesmee's face at the very end (what was that?). The practical effects, however, were actually quite exceptional. They finally made the vampires not look obvious, and Edward didn't look disgusting for once. So the makeup job on them was decent. The best work, however, was most likely a mix of practical and digital, making Bella look gaunt and deathly ill. It was done pretty dang well, so I must give credit where credit is due.

Was it a bad movie? It's Twilight, so there's no question. There are logical holes abound. The main characters are unlikable morons. The story goes on for far longer than they need to (Hell, the books alone could have easily been condensed into maybe 2 or 3 max, making this 2-part finale even more ridiculous than it already is). But was it entertaining? Yeah, it was. Like the previous film, it tried to actually be good for once, and at times it might have succeeded. But that also means it makes it a less entertaining Twilight film. As usual with this type of film, the following rating is based on entertainment only, not on overall quality.


I Am McLovin!

(P.S. There was a teen girl next to me who started squirming and going 'eww' when a certain character began drinking blood. This is a freakin' vampire story, girl. What the hell do you expect?)

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE.

We all know my feelings on Twilight (if not, check out my review of the books, as well as my thoughts on the first two movies). In quick summation, I've seen all the Twilight movies in theater (though not since) and think they are vastly superior to the books... mostly because they cut out most of the stupid and add in everything awesome the books cut out or glossed over. So now that I've seen the next installment, does this trend continue? By leaps and bounds.

Eclipse starts a year prior where a boy named Riley (Xavier Samuel) gets attacked and turned into a vampire. Pick up a year later, and we have Bella (Kristen Stewart) and her shiny vampire boyfriend Edward (Robert Pattinson). Edward continues to ask Bella to marry him, and she continues to (illogically) turn him down, though begs to be turned into a vampire instead. Her father Charlie (Billy Burke) would prefer her to be with her old friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner), who just so happens to be a shapeshifter/werewolf (though not really a werewolf). And Jacob loves Bella and won't take no for an answer. Meanwhile, chaos is going on in nearby Seattle where Riley is building an army of powerful newborn vampires. Oh, and Victoria (Bryce Dallas Howard) is back, hanging around the Forks forestry... (I wonder if these can be connected?). So now the Cullen family (Jackson Rathbone, Ashley Greene, Peter Facinelli, Elizabeth Reaser, Kellan Lutz, and Nikki Reed) must figure out a way to stop what's going on in Seattle while simultaneously protecting Bella before the Volturi show up to investigate (assuming they aren't responsible for it themselves) and find out that Edward hasn't broken his promise by not having turned Bella into a vampire yet.

Eclipse is considered the best of the books, and it is certainly the best of the movies thus far. Unlike the previous two, it wasn't even mostly so bad it was good. On the whole, it was actually a decent movie. Yes, it has its Twilight-y cheese and stupidness. The "I won't marry you, but I want you to turn me in a vampire so I can be with you forever" thing is still insanely idiotic and nonsensical. The dialogue is mostly horrendous (with a few scene exceptions) and delivered painfully. Because, as we all know, the Twilight movies are famous for their cardboard performances that can make Hayden Christensen look like Marlon Brando.

What made it decent was the fact that, similar to the previous movies, it added in a whole section that isn't in the book. Riley becomes a pretty huge part of the film, getting pretty much every other, or maybe every third scene. You see what's going on with him in Seattle, etc., which is only mentioned briefly every now and then in the book. Also, you get to see the creation of Bree (played by Jodelle Ferland), though she's pretty much only shown in two scenes--maybe one and a half--prior to the climax battle (and I would have liked to see more of her, which could have given the ending a bit bigger impact). And that's another thing. You actually get to see the battle! Again, like the other two movies, this one adds in an actual climax fight where the books did not. In this case, the book had the battle happen "off screen" while the fight in front of Bella was happening so fast she couldn't see it. The movie, on the other hand, shows it all. The only downside to all the action? It's almost completely bloodless... and for a very strange reason. I don't remember this description in the books, so correct me if I'm wrong... but the vampires here break off like ice when they're hit. It's very odd... almost comically so. I mean, it kinda explains the "sparkling in the sunlight" bit, assuming they're made of ice and/or diamonds. But it's just... strange.

Again, the acting is painfully dull, with only a few exceptions. Xavier Samuel as Riley, Taylor Lautner as Jacob, and Jodelle Ferland as Bree (despite her only having about half a line). Normally I have Ashley Greene's Alice and Anna Kendrick's Jessica in this list, but they're in the movie so little, it's pretty pointless to even bring them up. But Taylor Lautner continues to be really the only one of the main bunch to show any kind of range, which I know isn't true considering I've seen Kristen Stewart act very well in other things.

One thing that continues to bother me is how well, writing-wise, these books are adapted to the screen (while other adaptations, such as the quite recent Last Airbender, are adapted so poorly). I mean, honestly, these movies are not only faithful to their source material, but they actually improve upon them. The only thing I can actually think of that this movie left out from the book is when Charlie congratulates Jacob on forcing himself on his daughter and then subsequently breaking her hand... which I'm monumentally ecstatic they left out of the movie (it made me want to throw the book across the room for its stupidness). If any Twi-fans hate the movies, it's only because they don't realize how terrible the books are while reading them. Most of the dialogue and mannerisms come straight from the page. And I mentioned earlier how there were a couple scene exceptions that don't have the bad dialogue... I was very happy to learn that the tent scene was left in the movie, as it was probably one of the few things Stephenie Meyer wrote well in the entire series. And it's probably one of the best non-action scenes of the movie.

Overall, the movie has pretty good pacing, with only a few lags here and there near the end. There was a decent balance with the cheesy romance scenes and the added Riley stuff, giving the movie a sense of building suspense and purpose. The acting isn't any better than the last two, except where you'd imagine it would be (Taylor Lautner et al.). The visual effects, particularly the wolves, are much better than in New Moon, and they look really good. Really, it doesn't matter what this review says. If you haven't seen the first two, you're not gonna see this one. If you saw the first two, you'll see this one no matter what. I don't think I've ever heard of any Twilight fan that was on the fence about seeing the next movie. Unless, of course, you're like me and don't care for the series, but have a disturbing fascination... like watching a train wreck. It's not a bad movie. It's not great by any means, but it's not bad. And it's probably the first one I saw where I didn't feel completely embarrassed after having watched it. I can't not give it the following rating, considering I gave the last two this rating and I consider this one better than the last two... but again, know that it's not a score based on the film's quality, but of its entertainment value (whether that means it was actually good or so bad it was good).


A Keanu 'Whoa'

(P.S. The most disappointing factor of this experience? They didn't show the Deathly Hallows trailer before the movie as promised...)

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON.

I'm gonna do this review a bit differently than usual (don't worry, you're not missing anything by me skipping the usual plot blurb at the beginning. There isn't much of one to begin with. Anywho...). It's no secret that I have a large disliking of the Twilight books. Yes, I've read them all. No, it's not because I'm a lit snob (I'm really not). If you want a full list of reasons why I don't care for them, you can check here. Otherwise, I'll keep it to New Moon in this post. And on top of not liking the books, I hated New Moon the most of them all. But ever since I saw the first film and discovered, much to my surprise, that the film was actually better than the book (not hard to do when all you can do is make improvements... the books are, for the most part, unfilmable to any common viewer, so they have to add into the films everything the book was lacking to make them work), I actually started to anticipate New Moon. I wondered if it would take out everything that made me hate New Moon: The Book and make New Moon: The Movie actually enjoyable.

So let's go through a list of why I hated New Moon: The Book so much:

1) Bella is an insufferable, unlikable, selfish character who just uses and abuses those around her to satisfy her own needs.

2) Jacob goes from great character and much more suitable love interest to unlikable jerk about halfway in.

3) All depression, not much humor. And without much plot to keep you going, that's not that great.

4) Long, drawn out scenes of Bella being a moaning zombie... and not that kind that eats human flesh.

5) Absolutely zero action (as is the case with basically the whole series, really).

So how does New Moon: The Movie fare with these five aspects? Let's see:

1) Bella, unfortunately, is still an insufferable, unlikable, selfish character who just uses and abuses those around her to satisfy her own needs. But hey, at least she admits it once or twice in the movie (not in those harsh of words, but whatever). Oh, quick note while we're on the subject of admitting things. I love an admission she makes at the beginning of the movie that I don't believe she makes in the book. Bella and Edward are fighting over age, and Bella says something along the lines of "Isn't this kinda gross? I should be disgusted" based on their age difference. That made me smile.

2) Jacob... oh, Jacob. I loved Jacob in the first half of the book and came to hate him in the second half. In fact, Jacob didn't start to turn back around to likable again until about the mid-point of the last book. So I am delighted to announce that not only does Jacob stay likable in the movie, but his bursts of anger feel more rationalized in the movie than in the book. However, because of this, I feel movie goers are going to have an even harder time accepting that Bella would rather choose Edward over him. I think the only thing that helped me rationalize her choice in the book was the fact that Jacob became kind of a douche at times. And while he has some moments in the movie, they actually make some kind of sense, unlike the book. But the actor did a really good job with the character. He was very fitting (and funny).

3) Which brings us to our next point. The book was pretty dark, dull, and depressing. Like the book, the movie still has not much of a plot, and just kinda bounces from scene to scene. But the movie inserted some much needed comedy, particularly with Jacob and his La Push friends (though I'm actually kinda upset that they basically all but removed Quil and Embry, giving them only a couple lines each). And surprisingly, a lot of the humor was purposeful. Though there was quite a bit that wasn't, as well. For instance, there's a scene with Edward walking in slow motion as the wind blows his shirt back, as if he's some TV model (who eventually starts to sparkle). I'm sorry, but that's just so terrible it's funny. That's really the only thing that helped me get over the ridiculous melodrama of the whole thing--it takes itself so freakin' seriously that it almost makes a mockery of itself. In fact, I'm wondering if the director purposefully gave it some self-deprecating moments because he understood just how silly it was.

4) So, I've already mentioned the melodrama. Some of this does, indeed, include Bella as a moaning zombie. Her nightmares are particularly stupid, as she continually screams into the night, annoying her father (who is so far continuing to be one of the better film version characters) along with the audience. However, one of the eye-rolling sequences of the book (at least for me) was when there are just four pages with the name of the month on it, showing how she just mopes about for four months after Edward leaves. This is actually handled very artfully in the film. Bella sits in a chair staring out the window, and the camera slowly rotates around her. As the camera gets back to showing out the window, it shows a different season outside while giving a subtitle of the month. Eventually, there is also some voice-over of her speaking out her emails to Alice, which was a nice touch that I don't remember from the book. I like how they use the emails to Alice throughout the film to show that she's actually missing other Cullens besides Edward (of course, the emails don't go through, but she keeps trying nonetheless).

5) In the first film, they added the climax fight that wasn't shown in the book. They even tossed in some action bits here and there throughout the film to keep the tempo going. So how did this one fare? There were some moments interspersed... nothing really major, though. But they also added in the scuffle with the Volturi at the end, which was awesome. The action looks much better in this film than it did in the first. It's much more stylized and fun. You can tell they had a bigger budget this time around. One of my favorite scenes in the film is when Charlie and Harry are out searching for the "wolves," and Victoria shows up. The whole action of the scene is so muted with the music and it's really nicely shot. Of course, all this leads up to the "big scene" that jump starts (no pun intended) the climax. But tying all of it together was a great way to make it flow into the ending.

So I said the first Twilight film was better than the book. I also said I hated the book of New Moon, but would hope, like its predecessor, the movie version would also be better than the book. Was I right in this assumption? Yes, I think I was. And it pisses me off that Hollywood seems capable of adapting a bad book into an entertaining movie, yet seems incapable of adapting a good book into one. But that's another post.

I can't, in right mind, give it the following score for being a good movie. The acting is mediocre at best (the best of it coming from Billy Burke, Ashley Greene, Michael Sheen, and Taylor Lautner). But that's what makes it so laughably good (in adding to the melodrama). The characters aren't particularly likable (except, ironically, for the characters played by the aforementioned actors... except Michael Sheen, but I only say that because his is a villain, and he isn't 'likable' in the same respect). The dialogue, most straight from the book, is nearly vomit inducing. But there's still just something about it that I liked. Maybe it's just a good 'bad' movie. So I'm giving it this score based solely on entertainment, I suppose. And I can't wait to love/hate the next one (assuming it, like the last two, is better than the book).


A Keanu 'Whoa'

TWILIGHT.

As some of you might know, I’ve read all the Twilight books. I don’t consider myself an avid fan, but I have read them all, and I believe there are some pretty entertaining bits to be found within them. I also have often said that, as opposed to the norm, the Twilight series would probably work better as a film series than a book series. Tonight, I have taken a step further into believing that very theory.

After Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) moves away from her mom in the big city of Phoenix, Arizona to the small town of Forks, Washington with her dad, Charlie (Billy Burke), she doesn’t think anything will ever get better for her. She’s clumsy, and she hates the cold and the rain, so of course Forks, a town laden with constant rain and chill, would be ideal for her, right? But then she meets Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), a mysterious young man at her high school who seems to loath the very sight of her upon their first meeting. But as they start to know each other, they start to get closer. And when Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) entices her curiosity over the true nature of the Cullens, Bella starts on a journey to discover the truth about the family… that they’re vampires (though they feed off animals instead). But this cannot stop the true love. Oh no! It must prevail… even after a dangerous Tracker vampire by the name of James (Cam Gigandet) shows up and will stop at nothing to get Bella all to himself.

So first let me talk about the movie as an adaptation. I’ve been reading a lot of things about how this movie is so different from the book and how you shouldn’t go in to this film expecting it to be anything like the reading experience. Did we see the same film? Seriously, the movie was pretty dead on with the book. Sure, there were a few new scenes, a couple cut scenes, and other things like that, but every major scene was there, every major character was there, and basically every important element of the book was counted for. There was even dialogue taken straight from the book, and a voice-over narration very much like Bella’s first-person narration in the book (in fact, some of it is directly from her narration in the book).

The casting was pretty much perfect, specifically the Cullen family, even more specifically Alice and Emmett. They were pretty much dead on with my imagination. The others worked really well, too. The only complaints I have in casting were Bella and Jacob, and only moreso the latter. And it’s not because the acting was bad. In fact, I thought Taylor Lautner acted it just fine. But in the book, Jacob was this massive hulk of a guy, nearly twice Bella’s size (something more like Emmett). And even if he were thin in the first book and got huge later, I have no idea how they're going to pull that off with this guy in the next couple films. But besides his looks, he was good. And my Bella complaint was moreso on how she acted the character, which is probably more of a director complaint than an actress complaint. The Bella in the book is much funnier, wittier, and sharp. The Bella in the movie is so freakin serious and overdramatic all the time. She so totally doesn’t become whiny, serious, and overdramatic until book two. Oh, and one more complaint when it came to characters… what the heck was up with Carlisle’s super-thick white makeup upon his introduction? It got better later, but damn… that was some hardcore thickness right there.

To get into a few more of the movie workings, I had a few issues with logistics in things they did in changing/adding stuff. First of all, they made it the middle of March at the beginning of the movie, as opposed to the book when I believe it’s closer to January. This doesn’t seem like that big of a deal… until you get to the parking lot wreck scene when the whole place is icy. Granted, I don’t live in Washington, but will the ground really be covered in ice in March/April? Another thing is that Edward is so overprotective of Bella, mostly because of how clumsy she is. So why on Earth would he take her to the top of an incredibly tall tree and then let her loose to climb it on her own (much less Bella actually be willing to do so)? That just seemed incredibly out of character for the both of them.

On some other positive sides, there was some good chemistry between characters, though the two characters I felt had the most chemistry aren’t the two most would think. I felt that the relationship between Bella and her father Charlie was done very well. When a specific thing happens towards the end of the movie, I actually felt really bad, much like I did when I read it in the book. There was also some good chemistry between Bella and Jacob, and I really did like Jacob in the film despite his size. And they even added more of him in, which was smart. In the first book, he had a really bit role, and then becomes this huge character come the second installment. But they upped his role in the first film, which, again, I really liked. Finally, of course, there was the good chemistry between Bella and Edward. It was pretty tense most of the time, as Edward gets upset a lot in the first book. Though there wasn’t nearly as much humor between the two of them in the film as there was in the book (I mean, it was there… just not as much. They focused more on the serious stuff in the film).

But one of the biggest flaws of the film is also one of the biggest flaws of the books: Edward and Bella's relationship is purely superficial. And what people aren't seeming to grasp, including the uber-fans of the book, is this flaw. In the movie, Edward and Bella argue a lot before suddenly falling head-over-heels for each other for no apparent reason, and then will do anything for each other. Well, sorry to break this to you, but the books are exactly the same. If you take away every superficial quality about Edward (and even Jacob brings this up in one of the books), there'd be absolutely no reason that Bella would love him like she did. The relationship comes from nothing, is based on nothing, and stays hollow for the entirety of the series. And that was emphasized even further within this movie, even to the chagrin of the fans who thought it otherwise. So, yet again, the movie keeps to the heart of the books just fine.

The film is no masterpiece by any means, just like the book isn’t a new classic (no matter how much the fan base of 15-year-old girls thinks it is). Both the books and the films, once they make the others, will simmer down with time. But I figure that if they stick to it like they’re doing now, by staying close to the book, yet altering it just slightly so that it fits good for a movie, and taking out all the bad writing and annoying little descriptions of Edward’s godly breath and godly this and that (though they did almost allude to all of that during one part of the movie), then I really do believe that the movie series will be much better than the book series. I anticipate the next film now, especially since I hated that book the most in the series… I can’t wait to see if they actually make it good. After all, they did a pretty good job with this one (and the following score is more based on entertainment value and adaptation abilities than actual quality of film... plus, when it comes to the Twilight series, you aren't in it for quality to begin with anyway, so it's all good).

A Keanu 'Whoa'