Forever is only the beginning....says the Breaking Dawn trailer. Thanks for the warning.Those of you who know me will be aware of my feelings towards The Twilight Saga and towards Breaking Dawn in particular. If you aren't and you wish to familiarise yourself with my feelings, I ranted about it here:
http://livetoreadreadtolive.blogspot.com/2011/08/day-11-book-you-hated.html
In a nutshell I thought it was a poorly written excuse for a book that sends out shocking messages to it's teenage readership. It made me angry; it still makes me angry so it should perhaps come as no surprise that my feelings towards the film adaptation, the first part of which I saw last night, are less than positive.
By 'less than positive' I mean that I didn't think it was possible for a film to be that bad.
Why?
- It was slow - I found myself checking my watch several times which is never a good sign and I'm pretty sure had we gone to a later showing I'd have been asleep. [& yes, I know I fall asleep during films a lot of (all of) the time, but not generally at the cinema and it's ususally because I am tired and not because staying awake seems like one trial too much.]
- It was depressing and not so much because of the storyline (although yes, that was several shades of terrible) as because of the mediocre acting - I don't think I've come across anybody quite as wet as Kristin Stewart in my entire life, she's so dreary and her voice sets my teeth on edge. Eurgh. & Kristin and Robert are dating? Really? For real really? I have more chemistry with broccoli than she does with her actual boyfriend (and I hate broccoli.) Also Carlisle got fat which is depressing in itself, like Michael Buble - he got a little tubby too, did anybody else notice that at the CINRocks concert? Buble is defo tubbier in the face, another depressing fact but perhaps one for another day. (Note: I am not comparing Breaking Dawn to Buble. Never ever. I'm just easily distracted is all.)
- It was funny, which would be a plus if we were talking about a comedy. Somehow I think 'so bad it's funny' is not going to be the best selling point. I think Helen and I shared the cinema with some Twilight diehards - there were a few Breaking Dawn hoodies knocking about the foyer - so I felt a little bad at the way we kept bursting into laughter at what were probably supposed to be the tense dramatic exciting scenes. Whoops. Seriously though, there's this one scene for example where the werewolves are in wolf form and so can only communicate via their thoughts. They're having some big showdown over whether the pack should kill Bella and her unborn vampire baby and you know it's supposed to be edge-of-your-seat intense but oh my LORD it's funny. I shouldn't laugh, I shouldn't: but seriously, a huge chunk of dialouge SPOKEN BY WOLVES WITH ECHO VOICES? We're really supposed to take that shit seriously?
- There is a lot of background music slow motion "look how pretty Rpattz is/how much Bella loves Edward/how much Jacob loves Bella none-action. Oh man, there's a lot of that. Those were the parts that made time feel like it was going backwards, slowly. Like Helen said, it's to be hoped the scriptwriters weren't paid a lot because they clearly didn't do much! Miaow.
As for the plotline, well, I knew what I was letting myself in for and Breaking Dawn didn't disappoint. The things that made me angry in the book made me really really really uncomfortable on the big screen: the trashed bedroom and Bella's bruises after their wedding night and the way she begs Edward to have sex with her again was horrible but hardly anything compared to the pregnancy - the whole pregnancy stuff (and so the majority of the film) was just shocking.
The wedding was enough to put anybody off bothering; I for one am certainly reviewing my options! It was more like a funeral, with only Bella's white dress to give the game away and she looked like the unhappiest bride in the history of brides, its fine though because Edward whisked her away on a fancy dancy honeymoon after which would have been lovely had she married someone normal, less lovely given that she woke the morning after losing her virginity to a trashed bedroom and a load of bruises.
Nice.
What was nicer to watch was Edward's torment and Bella's telling him how happy she was about it and begging him to do it all again. In the real world this would be classed as an abusive relationship but it seems that's not the case if the abuser is undead. That was lovely stuff.
As for the whole vampire baby issue, I don't even know what to say. It was horrible. It starts with Bella standing up to hug Jacob, her t-shirt rides up and you get a blink and you'll miss it glimpse of her bruised bump. That was bad enough. From there we actually get to see the foetus killing Bella from the inside, there's a graphic scene where her bones snap and by the time she gives birth she's skeletal, like actually skeletal, sunken cheeks, hollow eyes, grey skin, bones jutting out all over the place. It's disturbing and hard to watch and I actually couldn't believe I was.
& then Jacob 'imprinted' on the newborn in some weird arse dream sequence freak scene. Can't beat a nice healthy bit pf paedophilia after two hours of wife-beating and killer!baby. Don't even get me started on that.
Somebody please please tell me how any of the messages this film/book/pile of shite are sending out are any kind of acceptable. Please.
This whole franchise is f*cked up on so many levels and I STILL fail to understand how people fail to see that, how it's been allowed to become what it has; I'd quite like to Avada Kedavra whoever's responsible for that, actually.
I blame Stephenie Meyer.
Get married at 18 even though it doesn't seem like you're really sure, cut yourself off from your parents, let your boyfriend beat you in the name of passion or love or whatever (the same boyfriend who abandoned you to months of self pity after he left you because of a paper cut) and then let your unborn child kill you, slowly and painfully. Way to go with the messages to your teen audience Twilight, way to go.
The only vaguely redeeming feature about the whole sorry mess was the 30 seconds or so of the film where RPattz was smiling. He is such a pretty boy when he smiles.
