King Size Movie Review: THE TWILIGHT SAGA - NEW MOON

Each week Brad King checks out the latest Hollywood has to offer and lets you know whether you should SEE IT, SKIP IT, or RENT IT with the King Size Movie Review.

I’ll be the first to admit that there are many things in the pop culture world that I never “got”. The Snuggie and Lady GaGa are two such recent examples. I don’t get their popularity, I don’t get their success, I don’t get why anyone would ever be interested in them. You can add Twilight to this list. Before seeing the first Twilight movie I had never heard of this supposed phenomenon. After seeing the movie I was utterly baffled as to how this was a huge success. Well one year and one sequel later and I remain as baffled as ever.

New Moon is part two of the four part Twilight Saga. It picks up with our angsty star-crossed teenage heroes sullenly in love. Bella, a human, has been having nightmares about her future with her undead boyfriend Edward Cullen, possibly the lamest vampire to ever hit the screen, big or small. In case you have somehow managed to miss the obvious analogy of two people from two different worlds falling in love Bella awakes from one such dream next to an open copy of Romeo & Juliet. Subtle like a sledgehammer. Anyway, she fears that when she is old and wrinkly the forever young Edward won’t want her anymore.

Meanwhile, Edward has fears of his own. He fears that he won’t be able to control himself and will eventually end up giving into his vamp instincts and bite Bella. His fears for her safety grow when she attends a birthday party in her honor with his vamp friends and family. She gets the world’s worst paper cut resulting in a gusher of blood only a few steps short of a Monty Python movie. One of the vamps attacks her; Edward “defends” her by shoving her through a piano, which results in more blood and more intense staring from Edward.

After that he decides the best thing for her safety is for he and his family to move away. Once he’s gone she spends her nights screaming in agony and spends her days blankly staring out a window or writing emails to an undeliverable address box. Though he’s gone she can still see him in spirit form anytime she is about to do something dangerous. He pops up like some kind of pale, ruby lipped Jiminy Cricket, warning her not to be reckless.   This, of course, only encourages her to become more reckless since she’ll take a spirit mother hen Edward over no Edward at all.

Her thrill seeking leads her to motorcycles which lead her to Jacob, a muscular friend from school who also happens to be a werewolf. He becomes her new protector and semi-boyfriend only he too tries to push her away to keep her safe. Soon she starts hanging out with him and his wolf pack family (apparently part of being a werewolf means never, ever wearing a shirt). The wolf pack replaces the vamp family that she used to hang out with. I expect that in the third movie she’ll start hanging out with a family of Frankenstein monsters. Get ahead of the curve and get your Team Frank shirts now!

Of course this leads to the two fighting for her dead-eyed love and eventually everyone ends up in front of the Volturi, some sort of Vampire Vatican.

New Moon wasn’t quite as bad as Twilight but it’s still terrible. It was pointed out to me that the reason it’s not as bad is because Robert Pattinson was in it a lot less. Pattinson is, teen idol status aside, an absolutely horrible actor. His range of emotions seems to be either mildly constipated or having severe abdominal pains. The rest of the cast, including Kristen Stewart as Bella, is not much better. The dialogue is some of the worst I’ve ever heard and the constant spinning camera work was making me sea sick.   SKIP IT.