Theatrical Review of Twilight

A thought occurred to me as the title "Twilight" popped up onto the screen a minute or two into the movie: this could be the biggest cinematic train wreck since "Ishtar" and every 12- to 14-year-old girl in the country will be lining up, with their parents, to see the vampire romance. You might ask now I came to that conclusion? Considering the reaction of the target audience any time Robert Pattinson came onto the screen or even as the lights went down and the Summit Entertainment logo popped onto the screen...I realized the relative merits of the flick aren't going to matter one bit.

The story centers on Bella (Kristen Stewart) moving to the Pacific Northwest from Arizona to live with her father. While an outsider at first, she develops a small group of friends-all outsiders themselves. And then Bella finds herself attracted to a strange boy, Edward (Pattinson), part of his own strange family. As she becomes more involved with his world, Bella can't help but fall in love with the pale boy. But is she setting herself up for more than heartache after a secret is revealed, putting Bella and her new family in harms way?

To call "Twilight" a vampire romance is mildly misleading. Yes, most of the main characters ARE indeed bloodsucking vampires. And yes, there is a romance at the heart of the film. What director Catherine Hardwicke ("Thirteen," "The Lords of Dogtown") has committed to screen may be the least bloody and most chaste film to deal with those twin topics. There is an undeniable genius to keeping the action as tame as it can possibly be in order to secure a family friendly MPAA rating; in this case, "Twilight" garnered a PG-13 when, in reality, a PG would have sufficed. But is this a true vampire story in the classic sense of the word? Nope. And is there a tried and true romance within the 122-minute running time? Again, nope.

My feeling is that every problem with the movie version of "Twilight" stems from the original source material, the 2005 novel of the same name. If anyone really cares to look deeper into the story, it has less to do with vampires and much, much more with a simple life lesson: acceptance. The idea of allowing people to be themselves no matter what form that self takes. This through line is tied to every character and relationship on the screen. Charlie (Billy Burke), Bella's father, has to accept the idea his little girl isn't so little anymore. Bella learns to accept the rules which go along with dating a vampire (staying out of sunlight due to sparkly skin, for instance). The Cullen's-Edward's family-are put in a position of accepting the human Bella as part of their family and protecting her when evil vamps come to feast. Screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg, Meyer and Hardwicke don't spend nearly enough time on this aspect of the plot in favor of moving the overall story forward. It's a shame, to be honest, considering the target demographic.

Then there's the story proper. The first hour moves glacially slow at setting up the situation, personalities and backstory. We're given scene after endless scene of a brooding Bella in a gray, overcast Washington state with Charlie not being able to relate to her at all. There are at least two instances of the Cullen clan being laughed at and ridiculed at school, not to mention foreboding warnings from local Indians about them. Scene after scene of exposition is positively tiresome until the hour mark, when Edward comes out to Bella. It's here the movie begins to move forward and engage the audience, not with lame "super speed" special effects, but with interesting characters. Despite the forward progression, Hardwicke never allows the movie to become a raucous roller coaster as it should be; the ride to the eventual climax remains all together too safe, as if she wanted to maintain the same speed and tempo through the entire production. There is no sense of true danger, a feeling compounded by a wholly uncompelling action sequence score by Carter Burwell.

Another issue with the structure is a reliance on the Edward and Bella characters to the exclusion of everyone else, especially the Cullen family. In order for the forced tension between Rosalie (Nikki Reed) and Bella to work, it helps to have had more than three lines of dialogue from the character. There is just enough of a framework to understand the conflict, though, to be fair. This also goes for the romance. It's more of a television-style whirlwind courtship. Sure, Bella-ward are drawn to one another; the idea is never fleshed out or given a modicum of respect by the screenplay.

It is entirely possible I'm being too rough on "Twilight," considering the audience it wants to reach and its origins. There's also the inherent problem in creating a franchise while telling a compelling first story. This isn't something along the lines of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" where the relationships were already created during the three seasons the series was on the air. Nor is it a James Bond film, in which we don't have a reason to expect to see each step in the progression of a new love. "Twilight" tends to have too many balls in the air at any one time to satisfactorily catch them all by the end.

I'll take a pass on commenting on the acting if only because most of the actors don't have much material to work with. Did anyone in their right mind talk about Harry Melling as Dudley Dursley in the first "Harry Potter" movie? No. However, by the time "Order of the Phoenix" rolled around, there was enough information to form an opinion on Melling's take on the character. Only Stewart and Pattinson have enough screen time to make an accurate assessment. And that assessment? A giant "meh." Neither does anything to distinguish themselves; they simply inhabit the screen. Are they serviceable as leads? Sure. Do they create a longing or attachment to their coupling? Let's just say the extended Cullen family is much more interesting.

During a pivotal baseball game-yes, I just mentioned baseball in a vampire movie-the future of the franchise begins to take shape and it's actually exciting. Instead of being a sappy, emotionless love story, there is potential for something greater: an epic series weaving together a romance, a group of heroic vampires "coming out" to the world and the continued story of accepting people those who are different. As a standalone production, "Twilight" rates a 4 out of 10. It lays the groundwork for what is to come, but would it have been so hard to make the action interesting?