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What it's about:
After nearly dying at the end of Twilight (2008), Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) finds her relationship with her vampire boyfriend Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) tested after a particularly nasty paper cut nearly costs Bella her life (again!) and forces Edward to leave her and the town of Forks to protect her. Bella falls into a deep depression without Edward, though her growing relationship with childhood friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner) rescues her from her own fragile psyche. Things get complicated when Jacob accepts his destiny as a werewolf and Bella makes the ultimate sacrifice for her beloved.
What we thought:
Look, let's be honest. No matter what I or any other critic has to say about the Twilight franchise (or Saga, as the marketing dept have re-imagined the film adaptations of Stephenie Meyer's best-selling novels) chances are that you have already made up your minds about it all. The soapy romantic sensibilities that make the books' core audience of teenage girls (and their mothers) weak at the knees, the vampires that don't really bite, the all-encompassing doom and joylessness have all the melodrama of Wuthering Heights, but with none of the grace. The Twilight Saga is what it is, and, like the gross-out comedic stylings of Leon Shuster, doesn't pretend to be anything more. So it’s completely resistant to criticism, even though critics continue to bang on the shield of imperviousness in which the die-hard Twilight fans (or Twi-hards) have cocooned themselves.
Since the Twilight movies so blatantly don't aspire to anything resembling artistic integrity, they deserve to be judged as such. The Twi-hards would have you believe that they don't really care anyway. The movie's mere existence seems to be enough for them. And the rest of us, looking for something more, will just have to endure the craze.
American Pie director Chris Weitz takes over from Catherine Hardwicke, and is tasked with bringing forth the torment of lost love, and most importantly, kickstarting the central tension between the vampire and the werewolf population of Forks. It's just that kind of town.
Bella's response to her own depression is more galling than all the violence in New Moon and Twilight put together. Physically wracked with crippling pain and nightmares since Edward's departure, she takes risks with her life and literally throws herself off a cliff to be closer to her love, who appears to her as an apparition when he senses she is in danger.
Watching Kristen Stewart mewl and blither her way through these scenes is embarrassing. Her performance is a far cry from her more commanding take on the role of Bella in the first movie. She also seems to have lost the ability to breathe properly. Every word is uttered as if it confuses her. Her stilted sentences seem to have no beginning, nor end. Hers is an obsession gone awry. It's the most bizarre, incoherent performance I have ever seen, and is made worse by its overwhelming self-importance.
Weitz also realises the vital importance of heart-throb of the moment, Robert Pattinson, to the film. So he gets shot like a GQ model with pasty skin, in slo-motion, a breeze conjured from nowhere to make his hair ruffle a bit and set off the swoons. The chemistry between the two leads, so palpable in Twilight, comes across as awkward and wooden. The jig is now up - those forlorn glances, chaste kisses and pouty lips are no longer able to mask the mediocrity so proudly presented here.
But thankfully, we're spared much of Stewart and Pattinson's emotional vacuity as the two are separated for much of the film, and the more interesting part of the story can develop - that of the budding relationship between Bella and Jacob, the knight who sort of rescues her from self-destruction. Much has been made of Taylor Lautner's impressive results after bulking up for the role of the young werewolf, and there can be no denying that his taut physique will cause many jaws to drop. He emerges as the most effective and affective of the young cast, even though he (like everyone in the movie) is saddled with some silly lines. He does spend most of the movie shirtless though, which might give some girls pause to question their allegiance to the grey-skinned Pattinson.
Freed from the stifling over-earnestness of the Bella-Edwards scenes, Weitz gets to have fun with the CGI werewolves, who seem to be the one area in which New Moon's improved budget was properly spent.
Somewhere in this already messy situation is the loose end from the previous film - Victoria (Rachelle Lefevre) is still out to get Bella in retaliation for the death of her mate James (Cam Gigandet). She isn't around much either but is gifted with the most beautifully balletic scene in the entire movie, as she is chased through the woods by a pack of werewolves. The music (Thom Yorke's "Hearing Damage") is inspired, and resuscitates the damp pace for three glorious minutes. Pity the rest of the movie wasn't made with as much ambition.
But New Moon doesn't really improve after that. There’s an improbable quickie trip to Italy, and more sparkling than the director can handle. Things do take a more delicious turn when Micheal Sheen pops in to show the kids how it's really done - playing Aro, leader of the vampire royal family the Volturi, with a menacing ease that's been sorely missing.
The fans will get their kicks from New Moon for sure. But I can't help the feeling that five years from now they're going to look back at this frenzy with a twinge of embarrassment. Somebody get them a True Blood DVD box set, stat.
