is well versed in the hatred of bad movies. This fits into the
worst movies of the decade so here it is, unaltered.
Twilight, directed by Catherine Hardwicke (the semi-famed
director of Thirteen) is the new vampire franchise taking the
nation by storm, but this blood sucking franchise just plain
old sucks. Twilight is based off the enigmatically popular young
adult book series where a girl loves a vampire and trouble ensues.
Bella (Kristen Stewart) is new to a small town where it constantly
rains and where she meets a nice pale, not so young man named
Edward (Robert Patterson) who reveals himself to be a vampire
when he uses his vampire powers to save her life. I can’t speak on
the books, but the film fails in every department.
The first problem I have with this movie is classifying its genre. If
Twilight is supposed to be a romance, I fail to feel the love.
Edward tells Bella that he loves her because she smells tasty and
he can’t read her mind, so he stalks her and admits to sneaking
into her bedroom to watch her sleep. What part of this sounds
romantic? Lex Luther and Superman had more romantic chemistry
than these two; not once is there a scene where you feel these two
characters bond. The interaction between these two ranges from
vicious interrogations to obvious stalking. Literally the only
compliment that I remember Edward giving is when he tells her she
smells irresistible. Why is Bella’s self esteem so low? What is it that
makes her think she can’t do better than the pale, socially awkward
stalker who wants to eat her?
The acting in this film is atrocious and among the worst I’ve ever
witnessed. Kristen Stewart is a complete eyesore at best. Stewart
either grunts or mumbles all of her dialogue which is accompanied
with these strange facial tics, making Bella seem like she’s brain
damaged, stoned and constipated all at once. Patterson is much of
the same minus the tics. Did Hardwicke give these two Ex Lax and
NyQuil before shoving them in front of the camera? The bad acting
doesn’t stop with the headliners- it trickles down to the entire
supporting cast. The acting from Bella’s school friends seems so
unnatural. They laugh too hard at unfunny jokes, or are too angry
in certain scenes. They’re just too much of everything. These
characters have too much emotion which is the exact opposite of
Stewart and Patterson who seem too devoid of emotion. The acting in
this movie was bad but it doesn’t help when you have an awful script.
Bella’s school mates are only a little less creepy than Edward.
They’re obsessed with her from the moment she sets foot on
campus, but unlike Edward who wants to suck her blood, they want
to suck her dry of her free time. They’re the people you avoid by
answering non-existent phone calls.
Twilight seems just bad the first time through, but the second time
enduring this diarrhea mess of a movie you ask yourself a lot of
questions. Why does this teacher have a fan in his classroom on a
cloudy, rainy day in the middle of march? Why does everyone think
those pale kids who never talk to anyone are so cool? Did that fire just
start itself? Why does Bella seeing a barefoot corpse get her to
figure out that Edward is a vampire? Do vampires eat shoes? I could
list a billion examples that display a lack of common sense and
attention to detail in both the writing and directing.
There are so many things that baffle me in this movie but the
one that confuses me the most is I can’t call Edward a vampire.
Unless you’re Amish, you’ve heard about some kind of vampires
whether it be Blade or at least Count Chocula. Vampires have rules
and weaknesses which Twilight seems to throw out the window.
Vampires are super strong and fast. Though Twilight gets this right, it
fails at everything else. Normally vampires have to drink human blood
in order to stay alive, but not in Twilight. Deer blood can do just fine.
Vampires in Twilight have a total lack of weaknesses-so much for garlic
and wooden stakes. The only way to kill a vampire is by tearing him
apart and burning the pieces. The biggest problem I have with the
vampires of Twilight is that they sparkle in sunlight; they don’t burn,
they sparkle. I can’t call them vampires because none of things that
apply to vampires apply to them-they don’t even have fangs. Imagine
if I made a football movie and the players used tennis rackets.
That’s the equivalent of what Twilight is doing with vampire folklore.
They’re not vampires, they’re deer hunting fairies.
Twilight isn’t all bad. We could use this movie as an in-class
educational video to show future directors on how not to ruin your
career, which is what happened to Catherine Hardwicke who was
fired from making the sequel because of her disastrous performance.
This film is a waste of time, and should be avoided at all costs.
Viewers beware.
