Perpetual Smile

If you haven’t seen the Twilight movie yet and don’t want it to be spoiled, skip this.

After much debate, I decided to go see the Twilight movie. I mainly decided to go because Nikki and Lauren had already seen it and had told me it was great.

I know that novel-based movies are never going to be as good as what you read. Most things just don’t translate well to screen. Still, I wanted to give it a chance.

It started off well enough. There was some narration, pretty much word-for-word from the novel. Forks was exactly how I’d pictured it, and Charlie’s house was pretty close. The narration started to get a little much after the first five minutes; I didn’t think they needed to explain as much.

Most of the movie felt like a made for television movie. It moved very slowly, and was really boring at times. The director seemed to pay more attention to certain things rather than the story as a whole — which was surprising because she (Catherine Hardwicke) also directed Thirteen, which is one of my favorite movies. The baseball and final fight scenes were really cool, but the scene in the meadow (where Edward shows Bella how he glows) was really drab. It looked as if they just threw body glitter on him; I had to squint to really see it.

The actor that played Edward, Robert Pattinson, also played Cedric Diggory in the Harry Potter movies. His accent slipped many times, making Edward’s voice seem anything but smooth. I think they could have gotten away without any voice coaching; after all, Carlisle found him in Europe. A European accent would have been alluring.

They completely skipped the part where Bella betrays Alice and Jasper in the airport. They didn’t get to James’s interest in Bella until the last twenty or thirty minutes of the movie. I guess it could have been worse, but I think it could have been a lot better. Mom and Kate said they think the next movie will be better, but I think it’s too soon to tell.

They gave it a shot, though, and I guess that’s all you can ever ask. I mean, I personally don’t like books made into movies. (I am kind of excited about the Shannara movie, though.) I didn’t want Twilight to be made into a movie, but I guess it was inevitable.

It also didn’t help that every time Edward came on screen, or Edward and Bella kissed, the little girls in the audience would scream and clap. Seriously. Kate had her face buried in my shoulder half the time, laughing hysterically.

Stephenie Meyer makes a cameo in the movie as a customer in the diner that Bella and Charlie go to. See if you can spot her.

I could go on and on, but what about you? What did you think of the movie? What did you like and dislike?