The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part One

HARRY SHUKMAN finds all the acting and script sucked out of the new Twilight installment.

bill condon Film film review harry shukman Kristen Stewart Robert Pattinson stephanie meyers Taylor Lautner the room The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part One True Blood Twilight Vampire

Directed by Bill Condon

[rating: 1/5]

Werewolf Jacob Black shouts halfway through the film: “I know how this ends and I’m not sticking around to watch.” And that’s exactly how I felt all the way through The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part One. I didn’t want to stick around to watch, because it made me feel like I was in front of some sick combination of The Room, a sex-less True Blood, and every boring pre-teenage girl’s diary ever.

Mega-virgin Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) and vampire Edward Cullen (pre-teen totty Robert Pattinson) finally bonk. The previous Twilight movies have all been building up to Edward finally bumping vampire uglies with Bella, which apparently can be fatal to humans. Fun times.

So after three films of emotionally running away from vampire cults, werewolf fights, and acting classes, Edward and Bella tie the knot and fly off to Brazil for a honeymoon where their first nookie together could be lethal for her.

There will be blood: Bella and Edward finally get busy

Faces that presumably should be showing ‘happy’ start showing ‘worried,’ as Bella gets knocked up with a half-human, half-vampire spawn that violates a treaty with a pack of angry werewolves, who now want it dead. It only gets worse when Bella’s gooey vampire centre starts killing her from the inside. Teenage pregnancy never ends well.

The adaptations of Stephanie Meyers’ best-selling books have so far been averagely bland and entirely forgettable, but Breaking Dawn sucks the passion out a much-loved series even more. Every scene is dripping with teen angst and mood swings. It’s difficult to take the characters seriously, or even care about them when they keep slamming doors, storming away and ripping shirts off, Matthew McConaughey style, in anger.

And moments that are meant to be more tender or serious are laugh-out-loud hilarious. There’s what should be a tense halfway moment where Bella has to drink blood to stay alive, and she is handed a smoothie cup with a straw.

Also deserving of a mention is her baby-to-be. If Bella manages to give birth the name of her wee vampire offsrping will be Renesmee (mothers Rene + Esmee = Renesmee, obviously). The playground is going to be a tough place for little Renesmee if she makes it out.

The film is two hours too long, the lines are laughable and the actors deliver them with all the emotional capabilities of a botox addict. If you are a die-hard fan of the series or just want to imagine R-Patz in and around your mouth, by all means enjoy. Otherwise stay far away, because Part Two is released in 2012.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1OHXR63a38