“New Moon”: New Starts for “Twilight” Saga?
By Alicia Desrochers
Staff Writer
It’s incredible how a movie with a B average rating can break every presale ticket record known to man.
The amazingly popular New Moon is the sequel to the equally sensational Twilight. Both movies are screen adaptations of the first two books in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight saga. The Twilight books follow the story of a teenage girl, Bella Swan, through the changes in her life when she meets, and falls in love with, the moody vampire Edward Cullen.
But, unless you have been living under a rock for the past few years, you already knew that.
New Moon was released on November 21st at exactly one minute past midnight all over the country.
Picture the scene: lots of screaming teenage and preteen girls standing in line for hours, just waiting for the doors to finally open. Most of their parents are mulling around, shaking their heads in exasperation, wondering how they got dragged into coming to the film.
Some of the parents may have actually walked away mildly impressed.
While the movie was nothing overly impressive, anyone who has known the movie franchise will find it an improvement on the last film.
New director Chris Weitz brought a new edge to the franchise, giving the audience, especially members who are not overly fond of the series, a few laughs along the journey. Humorous lines were inserted wherever possible, perhaps to improve on the dryness of Twilight.
Weitz also understood the need for a deeper portrayal of the secondary characters, and he managed to push them all forward into the best possible light.
Kellen Lutz, who plays Emmett, becomes everyone’s idea of a fun, huge older brother. Jackson Rathbone, who plays Jasper, goes from a barely speaking role to several rather humorous lines. Billy Burke, who plays Bella’s father, Charlie, shows his wit with perfectly executed dry humor, giving the audience the chuckles they so desire. And the humans who attend Forks High School with Bella provide the much-needed comedic relief when the storyline begins to badly falter.
In addition to the emphasis on secondary characters, Weitz successfully brings forward Taylor Lautner, who plays Jacob Black, as Bella’s new best friend and a werewolf, now a major player in the series. Lautner fills in the space with aplomb.
Of course, fans of the series (and, indeed, fans of the actors) will know that this film has several sections with Lautner and Robert Pattinson, who plays Edward, shirtless. By the sounds of squeals among the audience, this is surely one of the reasons this film sold so well.
On the other hand, leads Pattinson and Kristen Stewart, who portrays Bella, still don’t seem to have the promised chemistry. Or, indeed, any great ability to act.
Stewart, whether she is supposed to be happy, sad, angry, or excited, never shows any emotion beyond the occasional case of hyperventilating uncontrollably. Even at the happiest and most peaceful moments in the movie, Stewart never seems to smile, making her seem half-dead.
For a large part of New Moon, Stewart is supposed to play a very depressed Bella Swan. Unfortunately, she looks and acts depressed during the entire film, boring the audience and making it hard to distinguish the mood switch in her character.
Pattinson, a British actor who many know as Cedric Diggory from Harry Potter, still cannot seem to muster up any inflection in his voice. Viewers are put to sleep with his dull monotone, which sounds like he is reading a phone book to the camera.
The monotone worked, in part, at the very beginning of the movie. It made his humor dry and startling, giving an edge to a line which might not have been funny otherwise. But it grew very old rather quickly.
Another issue with this new installment to the series is the action. Weitz, in an attempt to liven up the movie for those members of the audience that are not hard-core fans, chose to add a few action scenes that were not written into the books.
The scenes failed, looking dull and, frankly, a bit ridiculous.
Viewers who saw Twilight will know about the poorly made “sparkle effect.” In the universe of Stephenie Meyer’s vampires, the undead sparkle in the sunlight. The effect was badly botched in the first film, making the actors appear sweaty and gross, not, as Meyer intended, like they had skin made from diamonds.
The effect, unfortunately, was not improved for the second film, despite the increase in budget for special effects and such things.
James O’Ehley of the Sci-Fi Movie Page said on the film: “This is still one of the silliest movie franchises out there and one which is totally critic proof. People will still go see it even if there are verifiable reports that watching it makes your eyes bleed.”
While no one left the theater with blood pouring from their eyes, O’Ehley’s statement is still accurate; no one will ever be able so say anything to dissuade fans from seeing this film.
The fans are coming by the tens of thousands and the money is still pouring in. However mediocre the movie actually is, one thing is for certain: New Moon is a box office success.
I loved the movie. And I agree with Kristiene. If you read the book Bella never fully recovers from Edward leaving her. She did it perfect. She is never really happy even at the end when she is with Edward because the age factor is still on her mind &+ with Edward coming back she is losing Jacob.
Kristen Stewart is the perfect Bella .. All around the casting was perfect, everyone had so much so much angst that they fit the story perfectly
Finally, a fellow teenager that understands how ridiculous the whole Twilight saga really is! This work was really refreshing. I have to agree with Radhika, the dry humor was lovely. Your work actually reminded me a bit of that Alex Day fellow on Youtube. He also pokes fun at the logistics of Twilight, which is fairly simple since there aren’t any. (:
Really like how you added dry humor into your article, and how you elaborated on other people’s reviews…
And you should have talked about Garth Franklin