LOVE SUCKS: a review of "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1"

“THE TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN-PART 1”
Based upon the novel by Stephanie Meyer
Screenplay Written by Melissa Rosenberg
Directed by Bill Condon
½ * (one half of one star)

Without question and please do not even try to debate me or convince me otherwise, “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is by far and away the worst film of this entire overwrought series. For that matter, please feel free and mentally add it to my recently released listings of the worst films of 2011. It is as pretentious as it is stupid. As numbingly portentous as it is asinine. Its awfulness is as epic as its spinelessness, hopelessness, and brainlessness. Frankly, this movie just sucks. So much so, that I would think that even actual vampires would stay far, far away from this brutally insipid, bombastic tripe.

Look, dear readers, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again with feeling. I know very well that I am not the intended audience for this series. These are films that are not in any way, shape or form designed for me and my particular sensibilities. But all of that being said, I did give Director Catherine Hardwicke’s earnest “Twilight” (2008), the series’ first installment, a pass and I will concede that the series reached new heights, albeit extremely sleight ones, with Director David Slade’s stylish third film, “Eclipse” (2010). But, Director Chris Weitz’s “New Moon” (2009), the abominably dirge like second film in the series, was the extreme low point as it transformed the exquisite pain of teenage heartbreak and subsequent depression into an almost unwatchable (and terribly acted) cauldron of self-pity that it became parody. With “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1,” now arrives a film so dreadful, that it makes “New Moon” appear to be high drama. My God, once this film completed, I sat staring slack jawed and mystified at the screen, wondering more than ever how this story could possibly be the very one that has captured the hearts and well earned dollars of millions upon millions. How could anyone take this story remotely seriously enough to buy the fantasy? How are Edward, Bella and Jacob remotely compelling characters to follow anywhere? My reaction towards “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is not one meant to be self-consciously snarky or trollish. No. I just think that this film is the very definition of what constitutes a bad movie and this movie is unforgivably bad.

“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” opens with our collective of now familiar characters each receiving an invitation to the culminating event of this series so far: the wedding of the pale skinned and well coiffed vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) to human dish rag Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart). Excitement, anticipation, parental nervousness and some amount of prurient teenage curiosity are fully abound amongst the guests, all except for teenage werewolf and eternally unrequited Jacob (Taylor Lautner) who responds to the news so distraughtly that he promptly rips off his shirt to allow his abs to do all of the emoting.

Despite some dark, pre-wedding dreams, the wedding goes off without a hitch and the happy couple begins to prepare for their anticipatory honeymoon where Bella and Edward will, at long last, consummate their long standing and sexually abstinent love affair once and for all. But, of course, Jacob (now clothed) happens by to express his discomfort with the fact that she will very soon be intimate with someone who may just be…ahem… too much man for her to handle. Regardless, Edward and Bella travel to a secluded island, swim around waterfalls, play chess, endure the endlessly terrible alternative rock songs that litter the soundtrack, continuously stare into each other’s eyes some more and finally, FINALLY, the two end up in bed where the bedposts shake, the walls tremble and then the film fades to black.

A mere 14 days later, Bella discovers that she is pregnant and her offspring is growing at an alarming rate. But since the baby is obviously not human, her body is not designed to support the gestation, thus placing her own life in mortal danger as well as potentially upending a long standing peace treaty between the Cullen vampire clan and Jacob’s werewolf family.

From here, the film turns to nothing more than a brain melting collage of hand-wringing concerning the potential fates of the increasingly emaciated Bella and the rapidly growing baby, which of course leads to the grisly birth sequence and ultimately, Bella’s wish-fulfillment fully realized as she dies to only be reborn as a vampire.

In many respects, it would not be entirely fair to compare and contrast this particular series with the recently concluded “Harry Potter" film series as the storylines for both are drastically different from each other. But, as both series, based on gargantuan best selling books, feature teenage characters caught in a growing mythology set partially within the fantasy world of magic and creatures, the comparisons cannot be overlooked. In regards to the film versions of both series, the comparisons also cannot be overlooked as we arrive at their respective finales. With Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, I truly felt that Hollywood made the right decision by cleaving the final book into two films as it supported the story, the fans and the “Harry Potter business” in tandem. Obviously, Hollywood wants to remain in the “Twilight business” for as long as possible as well. But unfortunately and despite the guiding hand of Oscar nominated Screenwriter (2002’s “Chicago”) and Director (1998’s “Gods And Monsters,” 2004’s “Kinsey” and 2006’s “Dreamgirls”) Bill Condon, who was hired to raise the pedigree and give the final films in this series a certain heft and panache it is all for naught. There is just absolutely nothing to recommend in this movie.

First of all, the pacing of the film is disastrously monotonous, falling into that soapy melodrama but without any of necessary passion or even campiness to make the material sing. “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is definitely a film in which absolutely NOTHING happens!! And worst of all, throughout the nearly two hour film, you can feel every single minute dully drift by. So much time is spent watching the Cullen family plus Jacob sitting around watching Bella, worrying about Bella, talking about Bella and all of this whining and crying for this self-absorbed, selfish, narcissistic girl who cares for no one but herself and her own wishes was insufferable. If that is all there is to this story, it makes me firmly question if there was any reason to cleave the final book into two films for any creative reasons at all.

The actual performances have always been a major problem for the “Twilight” films and “Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is no exception, especially as it features the threesome of Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner at their most monosyllabic and emotionally vacant, just inexcusable considering the events of this installment. I have hit Ms. Stewart pretty harshly throughout this series and again, I have to question as passionately as I am able, would it kill Kristen Stewart to elicit or better yet, try to learn even one new expression????? I mean—here she is being eaten from the inside by her vampire baby and she looks as if she is suffering from indigestion, the very same vapid, non-committed gaze she has utilized for every scene in every single one of these films. Honestly, dear readers, just please try to imagine what this series could be like if they powers that be just cast people who could act. Good actors go a long, long way, especially for a series that really needs strong actors in order for the fantasy to work but no, we’re stuck with these three attractive and painfully shallow leads.

Beyond the appalling performances, “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is saddled with indefensibly bad special effects, a kiss of death in our technically savvy age. Is it any coincidence that almost all of the major effects sequences occur in the dark of night? Perhaps that way, Condon and his team could potentially mask how amateurish and/or rushed the effects actually are. But, none was worse than the film’s gigantic howler (pun firmly intended) of all of the film’s scenes, which is unquestionably not the reportedly seizure inducing birth sequence but the “talking wolves” sequence where Jacob asserts his independence through a voice that still seems to have not even cracked puberty yet. I dare you to not give yourself a hernia through extreme laughter during this atrocious scene.

Good Lord, even the film score was painful as veteran composer Carter Burwell delivered a treacly, saccharine, pseudo-romantic and shockingly wall to wall score that was profoundly beneath his immense talents.

Yet, most of all are the story’s concepts and themes, which present a slapdash morality and are sloppily presented. I have said more than enough in past reviews about how I feel concerning the character of Bella Swan and how ineffective of a teenage heroine she actually is but I do really have to put into question of the message Stephanie Meyer is presenting concerning sexual discussion as well as intercourse. For characters who are just consumed with thoughts of sex, the dialogue is ridiculously chaste, especially when so much of the film deals with the concept of abortion. Bella, Edward and Jacob can have the thoughts but they cannot speak any of the words, I guess for fear the pre-teenage/teenage girls in the audience are just too young to hear them.

But then, there is the actual visual presentation of sex which does not extended anything further than what we’ve seen in the previous installments. Yet, when Bella and Edward do begin to go further, the film fades to black. But when it returns, we have images of Bella covered in bruises that she is unable to fully remember receiving. What kind of a message is that to present to those same pre-teenage/teenage girls whose ears are too delicate to hear words like “sex,” “penis” and “abortion”? That the only worthwhile sex there is in the type where you cannot remember how exactly your boudoir was destroyed or how those bruises appeared on your body?! Ah romance…

Look, if the theme of the series is abstinence and furthermore, pro-life, that is fine but please present the material with some sort of honest conviction and not through this nonsense about the sanctity of vampire/werewolf treaties merged with an abhorrently clumsy and painful abortion/pro-life metaphor. The fantasy felt false and the “reality” was even worse as its preachiness was condescending to say the least.

How was this movie not completely laughed off of the screen? Even from the series’ die-hard fans, how was a film this awful tolerated let alone a massive box office smash hit? And yet, I have a larger question to ask. What is happening is our current movie going culture that some audience members demanded their money back from a film like “The Tree Of Life” for being too esoteric or from even “The Artist” for not having dialogue and yet absolutely no one demanded their money back from a film that was just flat out abysmal?

“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1” is a film that offered not one solitary shred of romance, excitement, intelligence or artistry whatsoever and I am anxious for the whole damn enterprise to just be mercifully over.