Depends on the person's taste

Rating: 7/10 (1 November 2012)

The Twilight Saga Hype, is it Worth it?
Every adolescent girl's dream in 2012 seems to be to fall in love with an immortal creature, involving them in a supernatural war that could possibly destroy humankind. Add to the movie a saucy forbidden romance with a box office earning of 300 million dollars worldwide in the first week and you get the greatest movie in America. Amazing special effects, great actors, and an unpredictable plot are the components of making the best fantasy movie in America. The Twilight Saga, overall, impressed many people but did not set the standard with the first movie, Twilight. The 2008 release of the movie Twilight, based off the best-selling novels by Stephenie Meyer, in some areas disappointed fans who had previously read the books; but also emerged new ones, encouraging viewers to read the novels.
This new media sensation tells the story of Bella Swan who moves from sunny New Mexico to rainy Forks, Washington and has to start a new life with her father. Having to find ways to build a father daughter relationship becomes the least of her worries once she realizes she now has to deal with being the new girl in school. Entering Forks high school she become the main attraction to most students on campus who are intrigued by having a new person join their class and yet Bella finds her self paying attention to one person who shows no interest. After finally socializing with Edward Cullen she realizes that she wants more than a friendship with him, even after she discovers he really is a vampire, along with the rest of his family. Her long time friend Jacob Black, who happens to be a shape shifter by the time New Moon comes out, ends up being caught up in a battle between vampires and werewolves while deciding which supernatural character to spend the rest of her life with. This is a relatively realistic and retold story if you ignore the supernatural fictional characters. The story became your typical awkward girl comes to a new school and meets two "hot" guys and can't decide which one she wants. The Twilight cast and crew members understood this story line and turned it into the dramatic and corny whirlwind romance that a lot of teenage girls secretly wish they could have. Without the dramatic and inexpensive looking special effects, the director Catherine Hardwicke captured the world Stephenie Meyer imagined and created an engaging visual presentation of what every young girl was hoping to see. The sparkling skin and supernatural movements were a disappointment only because they were a little over the top and looked as if they were thrown into the movie last minute. The meadow scene particularly stands out because in the novel, what could have been important dialog to put into the movie had been cut out completely. If I had not read the book I probably would have been confused why the meadow scene was even put into sequence. The plot and time line of the movie generally followed that of the book, but of course did not include every detail, dialog, and scene or else the movie would have been longer than 122 minutes. Die-hard fans of the book series of course would probably want to sit through five plus hours of the movie just to get the whole feeling of the thousand pages they have read. Unfortunately, the budget of this movie and every movie just cannot please everyone. Therefore, a lot of cutting out and tweaking was done to compact a novel this size in such short a time. The sequel, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, directed by Chris Waits also did a good amount of removing scenes but satisfied the audience by adding cheesy and cute lines to fill in what could have been awkward blanks. Casting directors of the film, Deborah Aquila and Tricia Wood did an exceptional job of choosing which actors could best fit the characters with just one exception. Robert Pattison and Taylor Lautner, who play the supernatural characters trying to win Bella's love, make me want to choose a team but can't decide because they are both equally too nice to look at. On the acting side, both fit the roles quite well. Pattison made an impressive, charming, rough- around- the -edges bad boy vampire with that award winning smile and Lautner's baby face came in handy to pull off the look of a struggling teen in the Quileute clan who has yet to figure out his destiny in the pack. The Cullen family, which consists of big names like Sarah Clarke, Nikki Reed, Kellan Lutz, Peter Facanelli, and Ashley Greene, portraying the "vegetarian" vampire family, gave me some acting to look forward to throughout the movie. On the other hand, the role of Bella Swan, played by Kristen Stewart could have been a clever choice if she had not been awkward and emotionless the entire movie. I've seen her in other movies like The Runaways, Catch That Kid, and Snow White and the Huntsman and was surprised to see her not put her talents to full use. In the end I am pretty sure that is all you need in a movie is some nice eye candy to make you want to drag yourself out the house, or in my case look for it online, and watch it.
I would recommend this movie to any one interested in forbidden romance tales. The disappointment from this movie comes from the fact that movies that are based off of books are never truly as good as the books themselves. As I said before if the movie could be five plus hours and really went page by page (around a thousand), it would probably be the greatest love story to date alongside "Titanic." But of course, it is no Titanic and Pattison and Stewart definitely are no Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet.