A Cynical Look on Twilight

Now I've never been a big fan of books where the entire plot can be summarized in three sentences, but apparently this Twilight thing is big. At least among the teenage girl horde. As such, my sister and her friends went to see it. I saw it as well, through dubiously legal means. I, as always, have an opinion. This movie was hilarious, albeit unintentionally so. I'm of conflicted mind about criticism of the plot of the movie, because a movie should follow a book. However, I will go ahead and criticize the plot anyway.


The movie centers around the idea of love at first sight. Or, in this case, smell. Now I might be cynical and jaded, but the idea of someone stalking me before I even spoke to them seems creepy. Not the least bit romantic, more like something normal people seek restraining orders for. Apparently, however, the main female protagonist finds this bit of creepy stalking romantic. Enough of strange psyches though, for there's plenty more to talk about and this post should probably be kept shorter than the Constitution.

Before anything else can be said, I must applaud the acting of the actor portraying Jasper. He personifies the vacant lost puppy that I've come to expect from the novels. Beyond him, however, the acting is approximately equal to that of your average high school production. With less enthusiasm, of course. Also, the leading man, who is supposed to run away in a particular scene, floats away instead. I can't recall that particular mistake being made before. Speaking of the leading actor, he's in that picture on the left of your screen. Look at the picture and stop writing me hate mail. Thank you.

The plot, of course, is that the superhuman vampires do a lot of infighting. Apparently, Bella is heroin for these vampires, so they are all naturally after her. Somehow, she falls in love with the one boy that nobody at the school likes. Feeling which are, of course, reciprocated, regardless of how out of character that would be. Most of the first hour of the movie was meaningless. After a long period of hilarious ignorance, Bella discovers her boyfriend is a vampire. He talks to her. A lot. It was boring. Then Bella meets his family, which seems to genuinely like her. Except for the blond, but everyone knows blonds are dumb. Then more meaningless scenes, which help even out the symmetry of worthlessness on both sides of the hour mark. Then comes a casual loop, a near death, poison-sucking from a venomous creature (a whole set of problems in and of itself), and a dance. Now these problems aren't really faults in the movie, because the book is equally dumb. They don't make for easy watching, though.

Of course, it would be remiss of me to not mention the entire conflict could have been avoided if the idiot boyfriend would simply have Turned Bella. So that makes the plot not only boring but idiotic as well. Coupled with the lack of action, adventure, romance, drama, mystery, or any other sort of remotely redeeming value, I am forced to give this movie a 35. Out of 100. If in the market for something to watch with your Twilight-obsessed girlfriend, it gets a 75. Else, avoid. Go watch C-Span. At least then you'll learn something while being bored to sleep.

Fear not, those of you who liked this movie. While I look down my nose at you, you have sequels, which will doubtless by more dreadful than this movie, to look forward to.