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Kanyinsola Ajose-Adeogun
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Story
Bella Swan moves from Pheonix Arizona to Forks, a small town in Washington State to live with her father Charlie. At her new school, she meets Edward Cullen a mysterious vampire that she falls in love with.The story is one that doesn't require much involvement. Ideally, this kind of movie should focus on the characters and how they interact with each other, but there isn't a lot of that, however, I'm not watching Twilight for a character study.
This movie is based on a bestselling novel of the same name (which I haven't read). In all honesty, the basic plot of this movie is similar to that of most supernatural romance stories, especially those involving vampires. From The Vampire Diaries to The Florentine Series. All these stories have the exact same plot threads and follow and unassuming girl who falls in love with a vampire and ends up in mortal danger because of it. What makes this story different? I honestly couldn't tell you.
Acting
I'm not going to say the acting is bad. However, I wasn't impressed. All the performances lack any kind of nuance or definition. The cast lacks chemistry and because of that a lot of scenes come across as awkward, even though those aren't meant to be. There's also a lack of enthusiasm radiating off each character which makes the film boring.Kristen Stewart's Bella is unlikeable which isn't necessarily a bad thing, However, it's hard to care about her character when you feel like she doesn't care herself. Her character is the emotional core of the film and is devoid of emotion for most of the film. It makes it hard to connect with her.
Robert Pattinson's Edward is the definition of brooding protagonist and for the most part, it works, in the context of this story. (I also have to mention how creepy and borderline stalker-ish Edward is, because bruh!). His on-screen relationship with Kristen Stewart isn't very believable as the two don't have that much chemistry on-screen. In defence of his performance, he's given a lot of ridiculous lines and he's able to deliver a lot of them with genuine emotion, which surprised me.
The performances from the supporting cast all fall into the 'meh' category. They all work with what they're given and do a good job of carrying the movie and propelling the plot forward. The best supporting character and easily the most relatable is Charlie, Bella's dad who just wants to be normal and live his life (like most of us do)
Writing/Direction
This is where the film struggles, the writing in this film just doesn't cut it. The dialogue is very basic and it comes across as boring and unintentionally funny. The lack of dynamic writing is most evident in the characters. They are all very bland and don't have any defining traits except for moody. I'm not sure if the characters in the book were written this way (please let me know if they are) but it doesn't translate to screen very well, having boring characters results in a lack of investment in the story.Interestingly enough this movie has decent pacing. it does a good job of setting up the story and even though some scenes dragged on for longer than necessary, the movie as a whole never grinds to a halt, even though it dips.
CGI/Set Design
The CGI when used isn't terrible. There are scenes where it's noticeable but they're few and far between and never really took me out of the film.It has to be said that I hate the colour grading in this film. The colours aren't saturated and the film has a grey-blue tint to it that looks terrible. After googling pictures of Forks (You can't tell me I'm not dedicated), it's not perpetually grey. Having a colour scheme like this makes the film feel flat and even when something exciting is happening it's hard to engage with what happening because the colours start to blend together.
Score/Soundtrack
The movie is more soundtrack driven than score driven which is a shame because Bella's Lullaby is serene and peaceful and using more of the score would have made me connect more with the film. The soundtrack isn't bad but it never really struck a chord with me.Overall Thoughts
This film reeks of 2008 teen angst and hasn't aged well at all. The interesting thing about this movie and subsequent sequels isn't the story but its cultural impact. This series entered public consciousness at what you could call the right time and people fell in love with the story and there is part of me that still questions that.I went into this thinking I would roast this film but that's not the case. Is it good? Not particularly. Is it worth a roast? Probably. The best adjective to describe this film is bland, I wouldn't go so far as to call it boring but it's definitely lacking. Overall this film didn't do anything for me.
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