This weekend filmgoers flocked to see "Twilight," the movie based on the first book in the mega-popular vampire series and made it a huge hit.
For those not already familiar with the story of "Twilight," here's a primer: Quiet teenager Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) moves from Arizona to dreary small town Forks, WA to live with her estranged father. Shortly after arriving, she becomes intrigued by the mysterious Cullen family, especially Edward (Robert Pattinson), an attractive but strange boy. After talking to a number of people, including her friend Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) and Edward himself, Bella comes to realize that he and his family are actually a coven of vampires who live in secrecy and have chosen not to prey on humans. Oh, and she falls in love with him too.
"Twilight" is one of the most faithful book-to-film adaptations that I have ever seen. I'm not just talking about sticking to the story, the film also does an excellent job at evoking the tone of the novel. It's so successful that at some point I stopped being aware I was watching a movie and instead got the same feeling that I did when I read the novel... I felt like I had been pulled into the world of the story. That's a pretty rare thing; I can't remember the last time a movie was able to do that to me.
While the movie is still centered around the burgeoning love between Edward and Bella, the filmmakers have (thankfully) compacted much of that aspect down, which means that it now comes off a little more realistically (this also helps by making Edward and Bella less whiny than the way they sometimes come off in the book). At the same time, the action in the story has been greatly expanded; there are even new scenes that introduce us to the evil vampire clan of James, Victoria and Laurent as they carve a bloodstained path towards the Cullens. It's pretty obvious that the filmmakers were looking to expand the attraction of the story beyond the already existing, and largely female fan-base. The fact that they managed to successfully pull this off while still remaining so faithful to the original story is commendable. I predict a lot of guys getting dragged along by their sisters and girlfriends will be surprised at just how much they like the film too.
The movie does have a few flaws. The biggest problem I had with it is that I wanted to see more of the Cullen family, as the majority of their scenes with Bella and most of their backstories have been cut for time. Alice in particular feels a bit underused; most of her scenes seem to have been left on the cutting room floor, which makes me sad because she's my favorite character in the series (and in the novel she has a great backstory that connects her to James, so it's a pity they didn't use that). Also, the special effects are sometimes a little unconvincing; you can tell the movie was made on a lower budget. But no movie is ever perfect, and the complaints that I have are honestly very minor compared with how much the movie gets right. Besides, now that they are planning to film the rest of the series, we should get to spend much more time with the Cullen family in future installments.
As someone who is already deeply into the "Twilight" series, it's hard for me to predict exactly what non-Twilighters will think of the movie. I'm pretty confident that most people will like it, but this is definitely a movie meant to please the the fans first and foremost. And in that they have succeeded. If you already love "Twilight" then you should love the movie. If you're not yet familiar with or have adamantly refused to get into the series up to now, I still strongly recommend that you give the film a chance. You may be surprised. "Twilight" gets a 5 out of 5.
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