Terrific Leads Steal the Film

Rating: Null/10 (4 September 2011)

Twilight (2008)
** 1/2 (out of 4)
Teenager Bella (Kristen Stewart) goes to live with her father in the Northern Pacific and once there she falls for Edward (Robert Pattinson) who turns out to be a vampire. As a 31-year-old male it goes without saying but I'm not the target audience for this film and I'll admit upfront that I haven't heard a single page of any of the books. I'll even admit that I had never heard of this story until it became a box office hit. I really didn't expect too much but I was pleasantly surprised to see that there's actually quite a bit of good things in this movie, although at the same time there are some major problems. The greatest thing the film has going for it are the two lead performers who deliver dynamite performances and really save this movie from being something far worse. Stewart is wonderful as the strange teenager who finds herself in a strange place trying to connect with the father she hasn't seen in ages. She's also trying to fit into a school where she feels like an outsider and she then finally falls for someone who is untouchable in many ways. I thought the early part of the film did a very good job at building up her character and the actress managed to bring it a lot of weight and make her believable. Pattinson is also extremely good and I was really impressed with his laid-back approach. I thought he was very believable as the tortured soul who is caught between love and his own natural instincts. The two stars are wonderful together, have some great chemistry and they come off like a real couple. Director Catherine Hardwicke handles the material quite well but the biggest thing wrong with TWILIGHT is something that haunts a lot of films today and that's the fact that the screenplay isn't strong enough for a 126-minute running time. I'm really not sure how it happened but why on Earth do producer's feel a "B" movie needs to runs between two and three hours? The film starts off so well but every scene just gets to the point where it drags on and on and the ending, which you can see coming from a mile away, happens way too far into the story and by this point you're already starting to grow tired. The worst thing in the film is the extremely poor CGI effects, which are among some of the worst that you're ever going to see. With that said, if you're a fan of the books then it goes without saying that you're going to love the film. As someone not familiar with the story, I found the performances to be excellent and they're good enough for those non-fans to check out.