Friday, November 21, 2008

Twilight---Romance or Thriller?

Even though I had to pee like a racehorse during the opening credits, I couldn't get out of my seat for one minute of Twilight.
The movie starts out almost exactly like Last of the Mohicans, and ends winking to the audience of the trilogy yet to come.

From start to finish I totally loved the cinematography of Twilight. The directing and editing styles didn't remind me of any other movie I've seen before--totally original. Director Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen, Lords of Dogtown) must have a lot of creative juices. They must have mounted a camera on Peter Parker's shoulder for some of the shots, it seemed.

And, I admit to being wrong about my predictions of Twilight being miscast. The cast was almost perfect, with the exception of Rosalie and perhaps Dr. Carlisle.
The character Rosalie is lame enough to begin with, but Nikki Reed's (Thirteen, Lords of Dogtown) performance of her was even more lame. A very lame lame. Guess it helps to be friends with the director...
And Dr. Carlisle's character was supposed to be young but wise, however, Peter Facinelli's portrayal was just young and creepy--like a narrow-nosed version of Odo (shapeshifter from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine).

Bella and Edward (Kristen Stewart from In the Land of Women and The Messengers; Robert Pattinson from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) were not only perfectly cast, but went together perfectly.
In the books (I read them in case you haven't figured it out) Bella was always awkward, and Edward was always serious and seemingly in pain. The whole relationship was portrayed perfectly. Pattinson, despite all my doubts, was the perfect Edward. Stewart was born to play Bella as well. She's beautiful, but she's not from another planet.

My only complaints, I suppose, were that the story seemed rushed. It was two hours long already, and there wasn't anything I would have cut out, but it felt rushed.

But, in all honesty, the first movie's job is to introduce the relationship between Edward and Bella, and to introduce Stephanie Meyer's (author of the Twilight book series)version of vampires.

The special effects were, sometimes, distractingly obvious and low-budget. I think I saw similar effects in Xena: Warrior Princess.

Overall, I completely loved this movie even though I thought it was just going to be a flop designed to lure Twilight fans.
For those who don't know; a Twilight fan would see this movie THREE TIMES even if it was terrible and directed by Ed Wood's retarded nephew or someone. I congradulate the Twilight's film crew for doing a fantastic job even though, honestly, they didn't have to.

I'm still left with the question, however:
Romance or Thriller? Has a film ever been both? If you count Will Smith's relationship with a certain manakin in I Am Legend then yes.
But I don't count that.

Either way, bring a date.

-MovieKnight

And I peed for over a minute in the bathroom after the movie, in case you were worried.

1 comment:

Susan Knight said...

OK, TMI on the pee-ing....