Twilight: F- (0 stars)
I finally broke down and watched Twilight. My curiosity got the better of me. I had to see what the hype was all about. Don't worry, I didn't waste any money on it, I downloaded it illegally. Whoops, did I say that? For any of you FBI agents reading this, I paid legal tender (untraceable cash of course) to a non-descript vendor to rent said motion picture. Yes. Really. OK, so, where was I? Oh yeah, Twilight.
At first, I was duly impressed with the lighting, the neat trees of Oregon, and the overall cinematography. Unfortunately, that was the only redeeming feature of the film and was akin to liking the paint job on the car, but nothing else. Yes, it can make a good car awesome, but a 1979 Yugo with a cranberry red and white racing stripes paint job is still a piece of shit. As the saying goes, you can't polish a turd.
Where to even begin with this travesty of celluloid? I shall break this movie down into components:
Cinematography/Visual Effects: B+
Acting: F
Script: F-
Plot: F-
Overall, that means the film is around an F.
The cinematography was pretty good. There were a number of shots that were interesting, and although there were too many cuts for my taste, leaving the movie feeling like a TV show, the colors and scene choices were pretty good. The reason it's a B+ and not an A- is simple: Edward's sparkling. His supposed 'sparkling' came off as a blurry distortion like someone is coming out of a dream sequence. It's almost unnoticable. Attention Hollywood: if you are going to hype a movie, spend some $$ for some decent CGI, don't let some asshole with a kaleidoscope lens do your shots for you.
As for the acting... since most of the actors in this movie were relatively unknown, it was hard to tell where the fireplace-worthy script ended and the horrid acting began. However, Edward (Robert Pattinson) has appeared in some other flicks, most notably one of the Harry Potter movies, and although he is a fairly talentless actor, he is rather inoffensive when not in a lead role. Unfortunately, putting him in the lead, then compounding this mistake by giving him a script that could have been written by a 3rd grader, led to major problems. Every line he spoke was in the same, breathy, monotone, emotionless voice. Great, you're not only a vampire, you're a fucking emo-douchebag vampire. Not to mention that, but he's supposed to be 'gorgeous'? I realize the 'messed up hair' look is in, but does your led actor have to look like he just got out of bed? And gorgeous Robert Pattinson is not. His face is flat and his nose is smashed like a professional football player. And his eyebrows? Are you kidding me? There is one reason that man does not have a Uni-brow: John Deere. They had to get a tractor with a brush hog to chop that bastard in half. It looks like two caterpillars crawled up on his forehead and started fucking. Ugh. Bella was no help either, obviously having graduated from the Keanu Reaves School of Acting. You know the one, where Ben Affleck was an honor roll student? Yeah, well she failed a year there. Did you notice how much she blinks? Try a drinking game where you take a shot every time she blinks. You'll be drunk and about 15 shots behind after the first 30 seconds of her appearing on the screen. And all her lines are delivered with this same expression of surprise/shock, like someone just showed her pornographic photos of her mom with three midgets.
The script is perhaps the worst part of the entire movie. I don't know how close it is to the original writing, but if it's even 2% accurate, the publishers should be ashamed of themselves. The script consisted of cut-off sentences, stuttered words, and the actors looking at one another and being unable to say anything. Take, for example, Bella's lines:
*GASP* "Oh..." *heavy breathing* "Bu..." *GASP* "I.." *panting* "oo..."
That happened over and over and over and over and over... and I could keep on writing this, so I will say (over and over)^23. Yes, it was that bad. Now, read those lines again and imagine a porno. Not too much of a stretch is it? That's right, this movie had a script that was worthy of a porno. Bella treats her dad like shit and never tells him that she loves him. She never completely utters a coherent thought. Is she the long lost daughter of George W. Bush? Is she mentally incapacitated? She HAS NO FUCKING LINES. The story should be conveyed through one of two things: the script or the acting. Since the acting was of low quality at best and they couldn't convey that they were in pain after a leg was chopped off, the script had to do the job. Only problem was that the script was worse than the acting. The plot (such as it was) died only a short while into the film, leaving the viewer confused. If someone had not told me the general plotline before I saw the movie, I would have no idea what the fuck was going on. Obviously the producers saw this since they had Bella do a voice over to try and explain some of the shoddily stapled together story, but that fell flat, too.
Finally we come to the plot itself. I have seen more creativeness from my dogs, who eat their own feces and rub themselves on the corpses of dead rodents. Disregarding the actual storyline for a moment, take a look at the serious problems of logic:
- Vampires are not killed by sunlight
- Most vampires are evil and kill humans
- Vampires are super-fast, super-strong, and almost impossible to kill
OK... why don't vampires rule the world? They can make other vampires out of humans. They could obviously capture and breed humans for food much the same way we do with cattle. They have NO REASON to be afraid of humans, and yet... they wish to keep their identities a secret. WHY? For god's sake, WHY? If they are super-powerful and there is no easy way to destroy them, then who the fuck cares? Show yourself and tear up hell and creation and own the world! Traditionally, vampires are powerful creatures, yes, but they have limitations on them, such as being turned to dust by sunlight, being killed by wooden stakes, beheading, or immersion in running water. They sometimes have to live in coffins to regenerate. They are sometimes controlled by a master vampire. But in this world? Nope. They are free to do what they want and there is no simple way to kill one. Logically, an evil creature would have taken over the world by now. Plot fails there.
Problem 2: Location. Yes, the vampires live in the Pacific Northwest because they can't be seen in sunlight. But they have to move every so often or they are found out for what they are because they don't age. OK, well, how many areas can you live in the PNW without people recognizing you? Seriously. There are not that many places in the world that get very little sunlight all year. Where do they live when they're not lying their asses off? A cave? Do they live in a cave for 80 years until one generation forgets about them, then pop out and live in a town for 10-15 years, then go back to the cave? This really makes no sense. They're worldly, but they can't go places with sunlight. Hmm. This gets back to the main problem of why they don't just walk out in the sunlight and kill everyone. This is where True Blood did a much better job with the vampire logic, despite its own problems.
Maybe I should have read the books because they were 'better', but I think that 2 hours of my life is more than enough to devote to this cinematic disaster. The only hope is that 'Twilight' precedes the sunset, which is a metaphor for 'The End'. In the case of these movies, that sunset cannot come quickly enough.
At first, I was duly impressed with the lighting, the neat trees of Oregon, and the overall cinematography. Unfortunately, that was the only redeeming feature of the film and was akin to liking the paint job on the car, but nothing else. Yes, it can make a good car awesome, but a 1979 Yugo with a cranberry red and white racing stripes paint job is still a piece of shit. As the saying goes, you can't polish a turd.
Where to even begin with this travesty of celluloid? I shall break this movie down into components:
Cinematography/Visual Effects: B+
Acting: F
Script: F-
Plot: F-
Overall, that means the film is around an F.
The cinematography was pretty good. There were a number of shots that were interesting, and although there were too many cuts for my taste, leaving the movie feeling like a TV show, the colors and scene choices were pretty good. The reason it's a B+ and not an A- is simple: Edward's sparkling. His supposed 'sparkling' came off as a blurry distortion like someone is coming out of a dream sequence. It's almost unnoticable. Attention Hollywood: if you are going to hype a movie, spend some $$ for some decent CGI, don't let some asshole with a kaleidoscope lens do your shots for you.
As for the acting... since most of the actors in this movie were relatively unknown, it was hard to tell where the fireplace-worthy script ended and the horrid acting began. However, Edward (Robert Pattinson) has appeared in some other flicks, most notably one of the Harry Potter movies, and although he is a fairly talentless actor, he is rather inoffensive when not in a lead role. Unfortunately, putting him in the lead, then compounding this mistake by giving him a script that could have been written by a 3rd grader, led to major problems. Every line he spoke was in the same, breathy, monotone, emotionless voice. Great, you're not only a vampire, you're a fucking emo-douchebag vampire. Not to mention that, but he's supposed to be 'gorgeous'? I realize the 'messed up hair' look is in, but does your led actor have to look like he just got out of bed? And gorgeous Robert Pattinson is not. His face is flat and his nose is smashed like a professional football player. And his eyebrows? Are you kidding me? There is one reason that man does not have a Uni-brow: John Deere. They had to get a tractor with a brush hog to chop that bastard in half. It looks like two caterpillars crawled up on his forehead and started fucking. Ugh. Bella was no help either, obviously having graduated from the Keanu Reaves School of Acting. You know the one, where Ben Affleck was an honor roll student? Yeah, well she failed a year there. Did you notice how much she blinks? Try a drinking game where you take a shot every time she blinks. You'll be drunk and about 15 shots behind after the first 30 seconds of her appearing on the screen. And all her lines are delivered with this same expression of surprise/shock, like someone just showed her pornographic photos of her mom with three midgets.
The script is perhaps the worst part of the entire movie. I don't know how close it is to the original writing, but if it's even 2% accurate, the publishers should be ashamed of themselves. The script consisted of cut-off sentences, stuttered words, and the actors looking at one another and being unable to say anything. Take, for example, Bella's lines:
*GASP* "Oh..." *heavy breathing* "Bu..." *GASP* "I.." *panting* "oo..."
That happened over and over and over and over and over... and I could keep on writing this, so I will say (over and over)^23. Yes, it was that bad. Now, read those lines again and imagine a porno. Not too much of a stretch is it? That's right, this movie had a script that was worthy of a porno. Bella treats her dad like shit and never tells him that she loves him. She never completely utters a coherent thought. Is she the long lost daughter of George W. Bush? Is she mentally incapacitated? She HAS NO FUCKING LINES. The story should be conveyed through one of two things: the script or the acting. Since the acting was of low quality at best and they couldn't convey that they were in pain after a leg was chopped off, the script had to do the job. Only problem was that the script was worse than the acting. The plot (such as it was) died only a short while into the film, leaving the viewer confused. If someone had not told me the general plotline before I saw the movie, I would have no idea what the fuck was going on. Obviously the producers saw this since they had Bella do a voice over to try and explain some of the shoddily stapled together story, but that fell flat, too.
Finally we come to the plot itself. I have seen more creativeness from my dogs, who eat their own feces and rub themselves on the corpses of dead rodents. Disregarding the actual storyline for a moment, take a look at the serious problems of logic:
- Vampires are not killed by sunlight
- Most vampires are evil and kill humans
- Vampires are super-fast, super-strong, and almost impossible to kill
OK... why don't vampires rule the world? They can make other vampires out of humans. They could obviously capture and breed humans for food much the same way we do with cattle. They have NO REASON to be afraid of humans, and yet... they wish to keep their identities a secret. WHY? For god's sake, WHY? If they are super-powerful and there is no easy way to destroy them, then who the fuck cares? Show yourself and tear up hell and creation and own the world! Traditionally, vampires are powerful creatures, yes, but they have limitations on them, such as being turned to dust by sunlight, being killed by wooden stakes, beheading, or immersion in running water. They sometimes have to live in coffins to regenerate. They are sometimes controlled by a master vampire. But in this world? Nope. They are free to do what they want and there is no simple way to kill one. Logically, an evil creature would have taken over the world by now. Plot fails there.
Problem 2: Location. Yes, the vampires live in the Pacific Northwest because they can't be seen in sunlight. But they have to move every so often or they are found out for what they are because they don't age. OK, well, how many areas can you live in the PNW without people recognizing you? Seriously. There are not that many places in the world that get very little sunlight all year. Where do they live when they're not lying their asses off? A cave? Do they live in a cave for 80 years until one generation forgets about them, then pop out and live in a town for 10-15 years, then go back to the cave? This really makes no sense. They're worldly, but they can't go places with sunlight. Hmm. This gets back to the main problem of why they don't just walk out in the sunlight and kill everyone. This is where True Blood did a much better job with the vampire logic, despite its own problems.
Maybe I should have read the books because they were 'better', but I think that 2 hours of my life is more than enough to devote to this cinematic disaster. The only hope is that 'Twilight' precedes the sunset, which is a metaphor for 'The End'. In the case of these movies, that sunset cannot come quickly enough.
posted by ChemicalJesus at 5:14 PM
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