Twilight

In Twilight, Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) doesn't know if her new home, Forks, Washington, is right for her, how she feels about her mom's new marriage, and has no stable way to relate to her police chief father, Charlie (Billy Burke). However, there's one thing that she's unequivocally sure of: her love for Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), who happens to be a vampire. Twilight is a love story, and it's an amazing one at that. What's more, the film effectively explores teenage alienation, creating an engaging atmosphere in the process.

Adapted from Stephenie Meyer's mega-selling novel of the same name, Twilight has a pronounced literary feel. It's not the standard teen love flick a la a Disney Channel movie, and it's also not your average vampire movie. There's something Shakespearian to the dialogue, setup, and character chemistry. The storyline sticks closely to the book, which is what fans will want.

The tangled plot begins with Bella's mom, Renee (Sarah Clarke), remarrying a minor league baseball player. Since Bella's still a Junior in high school, she can't traipse around the U.S. with her mother, new step-father, and a bunch of minor leaguers. So, she moves up to one of the rainiest and cloudiest spots in the continental U.S., Forks, to live with her dad. Dad has no clue how to connect with a teenage girl, but Burke plays his role so convincingly that it's endearing. He tries to deck out Bella's room in purple, but she's apathetic, and their distance—physically and emotionally—is clear. When he faintly declares, "You're not in Phoenix anymore, Bells," her disappointment vividly comes through in Stewart's expressions. Both Stewart and Burke act with subtlety, and they naturally become their characters.

Bella's introduction into her new school is jarring. She floats through the school aimlessly, almost as if she tunes out everyone else. The whole world is static to her, and Stewart's blank facial movements illuminate her disillusionment. Bella can't connect with her classmates because she's more mature than they are, with a heightened sensitivity. Director Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen) evinces Bella's struggle as the new girl, switching from sweeping, empty shots to claustrophobic close-ups. Hardwicke highlights the town's foggy cover, and she lets it envelope Bella. Hardwicke explores the scenery deftly, carving a dark, lonely world for Bella to inhabit. Her examination of Bella's high school struggles hearken back to her work in Thirteen. The town feels like a dream, with its neverending haze and cold, wintry atmosphere. Hardwicke adds an edge to the film while preserving the text's integrity.

Needless to say, high school is no fun for Bella until she meets Edward. He's her lab partner, and he won't speak to her in the beginning. However, she's instantly enthralled by his pale complexion, light brown hair, piercing eyes, and removed sense of confidence. He's the dreamy guy that all of Bella's friends pine over, and he walks through the high school like an apparition, once again highlighted by Hardwicke's directorial talents. Edward only hangs out with his surrogate "family": Emmett (Kellan Lutz), Rosalie (Nikki Reed), Alice (Ashley Greene), and Jasper (Jackson Rathbone). They sit together in the lunchroom, and all of them have striking good looks and an ethereal calm. Bella soon discovers that they're all vampires, but no one else in school knows that. Greene, in particular, is fantastic as Alice Cullen, the bubbly, cute, future-seeing member of the Cullen family. She injects the character with a tangible happiness, bringing Alice to life vibrantly.

Things turn with Edward after he saves Bella from being crushed by a van. Suddenly, sexual tensions starts to rise, and they can no longer keep away from each other. Their interactions are electric as Edward fights his carnal urges and hunger for blood. Pattinson plays the character with an immense amount of tension and restraint. He treads a thin line and it makes for an intriguing dynamic. The Cullens are the "good vampires." They only drink animal blood and they keep to themselves. However, three nomadic vampires have been committing a crop of murders in the area, and as Bella gets closer to the Cullens they zero in on her. The last third of the film is where the vampire narrative and action kick into high gear.

One thing to be sure of is that Twilight is the start of something. It's the perfect segue for the big screen presence of a cultural phenomenon, and it's bound to catapult Kristen Stewart to A-List status.

—Rick Florino
11.21.08

Here's the deal with Twilight: Edward Cullen, a 100-something-year-old vampire who doesn't look a day over 17, is attending high school along with his adoptive vampire family. He's beautiful (Robert Pattinson is on the path to being the most sought-after man-child since Romeo + Juliet-era Leonardo DiCaprio), he can read minds, and virtually all of his female classmates alternate between fear (he's got something predatory going on) and lovesickness (but he's SOOOOO cute). In any case, he isn't interested. Enter Bella Swan, Teenage Girl. She's the new kid in a small, perpetually overcast Washington town called Forks. Her first days of school aren't exactly traumatizing; she makes friends easily and attracts her fair share of Forks boys, but she doesn't fit in and misses her home in Arizona. Everything changes after she locks eyes with Edward Cullen, who doesn't know if he should kill Bella (he admits the scent of her blood is like his "brand of heroin") or allow himself to fall in love with her. This is where The Teen Girl Effect comes into play. Twilight is grade-A film crack. The dialogue leaves much to be desired and the special effects are like something out of an old episode of The Outer Limits. Edward's inner struggle to resist the allure of Bella's blood and Bella's mixed feelings and hurt regarding Edward's erratic behavior play like a rushed attempt at paving the way to their first kiss.

It's not long before Edward and Bella declare their "unconditional, irrevocable" love for one another despite the inherent danger of a love affair between predator and prey (referred to as "the lion falling in love with the lamb" in both the book and film). Bella is willing to give up everything for a boy she hardly knows because she's convinced Edward is her true love, and to be separated from him would be unbearable. It's not a shining moment in terms of social progress for women -- however, if you are a teenage girl, or an adult who secretly keeps a warm place in your heart for your inner-teen to write bad poetry and long for the day her emo Prince Charming will realize just how special and different she really is, this movie delivers the goods. Twilight is almost a spot-on adaptation of the book, down to the mushroom ravioli Bella orders on her first sort-of date with Edward. Similar shout-outs to book fans occur throughout the course of the film; this, along with the casting (though he's not the hero of the story, Billy Burke makes a great protective father), captures the essence of the novel quite accurately.

In terms of bringing the book to life, Twilight is a complete success, so much so that most of the film's flaws work within the context of the story. Kristen Stewart is sometimes awkward and self-conscious in her delivery, but Bella is an awkward, self-conscious character. Robert Pattinson appears to have taken a hint from Buffy the Vampire Slayer's Angel and attended Broody Vampires Who Hate Their Predatory Nature 101, but that's the nature of Edward Cullen. Director Catherine Hardwicke's influence shows in the rival vampire clan (James [Cam Gigandet], Laurent [Edi Gathegi], and Victoria [Rachelle Lefevre]), who offer a subtly different menace than the Cullens, in that where the Cullens are mostly a benign kind of scary, these vamps love the thrill of the hunt, and it shows. Unlike Edward's family, this clan doesn't believe in leading a "vegetarian" (code for drinking animal blood as opposed to human) lifestyle. These are not self-loathing vampires, and when they catch Bella's scent during a family baseball game, James assumes Bella is the post-game meal. The pacing gets a little odd after this -- Bella's leaving her father, she's in a car, she's on a plane, in a hotel room, outside the hotel, and inside the ballet studio where the epic vampire battle is to take place. Gigandet is appropriately creepy as a vampire obsessed with tracking and killing his prey, though once again the battle seems like an inconvenient obstacle preventing Bella and Edward from staring dreamily at one another. It's a forgivable sin, though -- after all, the Twilight demographic (and their unashamed adult fans) is prone to skipping to the kissing parts anyway. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide