Twilight Movie

Well I cheated and watched it online - thanks youtube! I had my expectations low because I knew there was no way it could live up to the book and had heard about it's suckage from several other people. What a disappointment. This story had the potential to be as amazing as the Notebook and the Lord of the Rings combined - both of which were movies based on books BTW, so good movies CAN be made from good books. Twilight was SUCH a good book, they had SO much to work with but totally dropped the ball. I seriously think they should just start over and redo the whole movie (like they did with the Hulk movie recently). Here is my "review" (I borrowed some wording from other reviews because I'm lazy - most of it is mine though.


1) First, the woman who wrote the screenplay should be shot! She wrote a contrived, confusing and ill-sequenced script. She took an amazing book and butchered it into a ridiculous script that didn't even makes sense half the time. I can't even imagine how confusing it would be for someone who had never read the book. I know that the target audience was primarily teenage girls, but c'mon! It was banal and over-articulated to the point of being ridiculous! Stephanie Meyers words were chopped up and spewed out with such randomness that just when I was beginning to get into the movie, here come's more trite dialogue that ruins the moment!

2) Secondly, the characters: Robert Pattinson was handsome (at times) but definitely not the degree of handsome that Bella describes in the book "so gorgeous that is hurts to look at him" - didn't see that at all. And the girl they cast as Bella - UGH! I couldn't stand her voice or her performance. She was NOT Bella. Not even close. Bella(Kristen) was stiff, uncomfortable and stilted. Bella, in the book, learned to unwind and come alive after her relationship with Edward took off - where was the love story? This was an angst story not a love story as it should have been protrayed. I felt that Kristen did not get Bella either. It was like she hated being there. Bella is funny and sarcastic and clumsy. Kristen was serious, depressing and moody. From the first words out of her mouth, she was not Bella at all. Parts that were funny in the book, were depressing coming out of her mouth

Some of the other characters did not materialize onto the screen either. Usually a good writer will give enough of a description (even writing subjectively as Bella does) of other characters that it can create a fairly universal ideal of that character, personality, etc. However, Carlisle in the movie did NOT look like the Carlisle I envisioned. He looked like a technicolor Mannequin, ready to be dressed and displayed in a Macy's deparment store window! It came across as cheesy and fake. Eric was not what I had imagined, as was Mike Newton, Billy Black, and of course, all of the Cullens, especially Jasper (who looked, I fear, even more homosexual and/or metrosexual than any gay men I've known!). I was also highly suspect of Emmett, in the movie, wearing a purple tracksuit and hat turned sideways, all gangsta', like a wanna-be Vanilla Ice. And Robert Pattinson was rather "furry"....his arms, some strands of chest hair, etc. Isn't Edward described as "cool marble" in the book? I would doubt a 100 year old vampire would have body hair that was auburn colored. Just not believable even though the book is fictional and using mythical creatures!

Rosalee?? All I can say is WTH?! She is supposed to be the most beautiful woman in the world, Bella talks at length at how beautiful she is and the girl they cast as Rosalee just wasn't. Not even close. Is it really that hard to find a gorgeous blond actress in Hollywood??!

Alice - I actually liked the girl who played Alice, I imagined her smaller and shorter but she was pretty close. I wish they would have developed her character more, Bella loves Alice and they are best friends but you don't see that at all in the movie.

I also didn't like how they left out Carlisle's story which is not only important to explain him as a character but the whole Cullen family. His story would have really came in handy at the end when Alice has to call Carlisle over because Bella is bleeding and she is having trouble fighting her hunger.

3) What happened to the meadow scene? This is arguably THE most pivotal moment in the Edward/Bella relationship, and one of the most touching moments...it reveals their intimacy and love and Edward's torment (and sets important inner-conflict/stage for the next three books)... What happened????? Why was this scene relegated to a music montage, and a camera spinning out of them laying in the sun?


4) The acting: Well, I'd like to predict, Alice-like, that there won't be any awards given for giving a truly believable emotional performance. When Edward (Pattinson) grimaces the first time he sees Bella, it looks like he's got diarrhea coming on, not, as we know from the book, a certain grimacing displeasure from reacting to Bella's scent and blood so strongly. The acting was over-done, the emotional embellishment not entirely believable and Bella did not come across believable at all. There was no love or passion in her performance, it was just flat and dull. It looked like the actress playing her had botox done, because I don't recall her forehead ever registering any sort of emotion, as what happens when someone frowns or is lost in thought, etc. She acted very blandly, Pattinson overdid the love parts and the scene in the meadow while they are playing baseball...well, let's just say we weren't the only ones who found the scene when they are about to fight over Bella just a wee bit ridiculous and stupid! I wish I could imitate for you, personally, the looks of fake growling and hissing they did....I was embarassed for them!


5) The special effects: Again, not a prize winner. I've seen indie films where the special effects were done on a tight budget but done tastefully. Edward running through the forest looked like fake Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon outtakes. Them climbing into tall trees? Not in the book and certainly not pivotal to the story.....and let us not forget the AWFUL way that Ms. Rosenberg interpreted how sunlight reflects off of a Vampires skin....glitter? That's what it looked like....Edward looked like a Abba reject from the disco era...I was waiting for a disco ball to drop right out of the sky at that point...I could put glitter on my body and go out into the sun and look like Edward did. It would have been amazing if he'd looked like I/we imagined: it would be akin to taking a crystal and holding it into the sunlight..or a big diamond, and letting all of the suns rays refect from the surface into millions of brilliant, rainbow-colored arrays. Instead, we got glitter. This was NOT a Mariah Carey movie!

Overall, a very disappointing failed attempt to take a great story and visualize it on screen. :(