Great - But why does it look like a film school project?

Rating: 7/10 (28 November 2008)

While the movie Twilight doesn't cover *all* the heart throbbing teenage angst and romance, they did do a great job of the material the makers chose to cover. I had to swallow my original comments about Pattinson as Edward, on the whole, he did a very convincing love struck vampire, and Kristin Stewart played admirably (although her emotional gamut never seemed to stray from either awkward confusion or awkward desire).
The filming was, again, for the most part, a breath of fresh air. The clunky transitions and hand-held shots did make the film feel slightly more "indie" than Hollywood. This is where my "school project" beef starts however, as it did begin to feel like young punks with a camera trying to strut their stuff. Some of the camera work seemed contrived and distracting. If it was a film school project we'd have to fail the special effects fellow, as Edward's vampire jumps came complete with motion trails and the none too subtle "whoosh" sound effect. Somehow, blazing along the forest trails with Bella on his back he could move fast enough to incur the "whoosh" sound byte without causing Bella's hair to move, or to provoke even the slightest reaction out of our sedate heroine. It was also jarring to see the "immortal" Edward clinging for dear life to the tree tops while supposedly showing of for the more serene Bella.
The greatest support to my film project accusation however is in the casting. It was as if they took a classroom of actors and assigned them all roles. "OK, you are Bella, and you would make a great Edward... lets see where we can put the rest of you...". Particularly the Cullen family - Dr. Cullen was not the charismatic vampiric patriarch from the books, and really - that hair dye and makeup... Esme looked one step from barefoot and pregnant with three little children clinging to her knees (why not an actress like Michelle Pfeifer?). Is Hollywood so short on gorgeous blonds that they had to take a "cute" brunette and give her a wig to represent the siren-like 'Rosalie'? The other actors were passable (exeption Gigandet for the villain James - sorry, you couldn't pass as a high school bully). But for me the real let down was Alice. Although Ashley Greene is a good looking girl, she brought nothing to the slight nymph-like character that was supposed to be Alice.
Overall, the movie was quite good, but also a frustration. Why, with the mountain of support of millions of readers (and their millions of dollars) could they not have taken the movie a step further and come out with an unforgettable film, instead of the B+ film school product that they ended up with?