Thursday, October 14, 2010

The Highlight of Twilight

Horrendous! That’s the first word that came to my mind when the credits started rolling. I spent a little more time thinking but there didn’t seem to be a more appropriate word. Actually the word was bouncing around my head throughout the time I was watching the movie Twilight but I kept giving the movie makers the benefit of the doubt thinking that they would add some major twist in the end that would somehow make the entire exercise meaningful. Was I wrong or was I wrong?

On the face of it, the movie seemed promising for a Sunday night watch. After all the Twilight series of novels has sold over 100 million copies worldwide as of march 2010. Add to that pirated prints and ebooks and you have a massive reading audience. Gross revenues of $ 1,747,822,231 from the 3 movies made so far sealed the deal. To me any movie that is made based on a best selling book is usually good because the author would have taken time and effort to build a plot and characters and weave a story that will have you hooked.

Unless you are a best selling Indian author who has achieved critical (?) acclaim for writing books that are to put it modestly a bucket load of horse crap but seem to fly off the shelves for no apparent reason and ultimately get made into movies. Coming back to twilight, the formula seemed to be pretty straight forward, how could you mess up a teenage love story with vampires and werewolves?

Apparently it’s pretty easy to do so. The heroine Isabella is drawn to the mind reading vampire Edward who used to eat only animals for decades but now that he has smelt Isabella's scent, he lusts for her blood and fears he cannot stop himself. This of course would convert poor Isabella into a vampire as well and being the normal sensible American teenager that she is, she falls in love with him and cannot keep herself away.

Waitaminute, why would a normal sensible American teenager fall in love with a vampire who wants to take a drink from her bloodstream? Guess I forgot to read the memo about leaving my brains outside while watching the movie. If you are still are confused as I am check out these quotes from the movie.
Edward – “My family, we're different from others of our kind we only drink animal blood, but you, your scent, it’s like a drug to me you. Its like youre my own personal brand of heroin.”
Isabella – “About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was a part of him, and I didn't know how dominate that part might be, that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him."

Hah, free brainfreeze !

It seems that the lead pair was half way through the acting course of some fly by night operator on Broadway when they started shooting the movie. Consequently it looks as if they have under acted (if it was done deliberately, then its even worse) and they have no chemistry whatsoever. So you don’t really want the two of them to end up together (even if it appears that he would love nothing better than to dig his fangs into her neck in the 1st scene of the next movie) which defeats the whole purpose of adding a love story to the plot.

Did I say plot? So here's what 5 minutes of thinking when you have nothing better to do in life can get you as an excuse for a movie plot
Girl moves to small town - Vampire saves girl - Girl and vampire fall in love - Bad vampire chases girl - Good vampires kill bad vampire - The end

Compare this to a movie with a proper love story like Notting Hill where Hugh Grant turns down Julia Roberts and you automatically think - Bollocks! William Thacker, you are the daftest guy in the history of movie characters. And when he realises that he’s made the biggest mistake of his life you feel incredibly happy and want him to somehow reach Julia Roberts before she leaves England for good. With Twilight, all I kept thinking was is she really that stupid? Why would she trust a vampire who wants her blood? Or am I stupid for still watching the stupid movie with a stupid storyline?

It’s been 3 days now and my head is still hurting from trying to figure out the movie. I’ve heard the sequel to Twilight is rather unbelievably, worse. In fact I’m already wondering what will be the first word that comes to my mind as the credits start rolling for The Twilight Saga : New Moon. Terrible? Atrocious? Appalling? Abysmal?

3 comments:

Buls said...

One suggestion... read the book first... you won't watch the movie. Even the last book has a flat climax. The entire movie tries to build up excitement for some action in the climax... but the action never happens. Avoid the sequels.

Anonymous said...

LOL..entertaining review but if only it was accurate as well!!!!
ill lend u all the books and movies if u want reason:even if u dont want) =P

Anonymous said...

LOL..entertaining review but if only it was accurate as well!!!!
ill lend u all the books and movies if u want (read:even if u dont want) =P