Ratings:
The Daily: 0 of 5 stars
Rotten Tomatoes: 29%
More on 'The Twilight Saga — Breaking Dawn Part 1'
IMDB
Official Website
Teenage girls are smarter and more discerning than given credit by the minds behind “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 1.” Still, it’s only natural to worry about the prescriptive powers of this movie, the fourth installment in the “Twilight” cinematic franchise, and the books on which it’s based. Much in the same way that we are now concerned about how boys’ early access to Internet porn is distorting and scripting their expectations of adult relations, how “Breaking Dawn” presents female sexuality and romantic “love” seems equally as toxic.
This penultimate film of the series commences on the eve of the wedding between lovelorn teen Bella (a recent high school grad) and her bloodsucking beau, Edward. It’s established that marriage is a compromise between them; Bella wants Edward to turn her into a vampire, but he, despite being centuries old, is a chivalrous sap, and wants to put a ring on it. They reach a détente — if she marries him, he’ll give in to both of the things she’s been begging him to do — turn her immortal and relieve her of her virginity.
In earlier “Twilight” installments, Bella’s feistiness made up for her being such a drip, but now, like the rest of the female characters, she is desperate to be possessed by a man. Kristen Stewart, who is likely out of a job once she grows too old to play sullen teens like Bella, conjures nervous half-smiles in anticipation of consummating her marriage. This is the only scene where Bella shows any real animus — pursuing her lust, despite Edward’s insistence that his passion and vampire super strength could easily overtake them both and she could die as a result. (This warning is repeated a half dozen times, in case the heavy-handed score didn’t clue you in.) Impetuous freak that she is, Bella goes for it. The tepid but lengthy sex scenes that follow cue a small exodus of (one imagines, embarrassed) young girls excusing themselves to go to the bathroom.
Still, Bella wants more — at any cost to her or the furnishings of their beachfront condo — and is denied and shamed by her husband for her desire. All the magical fantasy of their tropical and suddenly chaste honeymoon gives way to the even more fantastical realization that despite being dead for the last century or so, Edward is shooting DNA, not dust, and their holy-yet-unholy union has given it purchase in Bella’s womb.
Conveniently, the gestation of this undead life runs at 10 times the rate of a human fetus, so Bella grows grotesquely pregnant in the span of a week. This limits the “is it an immortal demon or not?” patter to a mere quarter of the film, leaving Edward only a few minutes to do a Google image search on what this misbegotten spawn may look like.
Despite that her fetus is killing her (and ruined her honeymoon), Bella is steadfast while everyone begs her to have an abortion without using the word “abortion.” As Bella wastes away, looking ghoulish and Karen Carpenter-like, she is presented as noble and beatific — she’s got a real zeal for suffering.
All the while, this baby-mama drama is broken up by various vampire vs. werewolf fights, a parade of hackneyed visual metaphors and vampires who are uniformly made up and bewigged in a manner that suggests they are competing in a drag ball once this baby reveals itself. The tension of the last half of the film rests on whether Bella and/or the baby in her belly dies (or undead-dies), climaxing in one of the most bizarre and revolting birth scenes to ever be projected on screen. But as disgusting as it may be, it’s a relief. Given that the storylines are suffused with so much supernatural camp — a shape-shifting BFF who is also a giant dog, immortal vampires upstaged by their hairpieces, telepathy — one hopes the overblown drama encourages young viewers to apply an equal amount of disbelief to the subtler parts of the film.
The Daily: 0 of 5 stars
Rotten Tomatoes: 29%
More on 'The Twilight Saga — Breaking Dawn Part 1'
IMDB
Official Website
Teenage girls are smarter and more discerning than given credit by the minds behind “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 1.” Still, it’s only natural to worry about the prescriptive powers of this movie, the fourth installment in the “Twilight” cinematic franchise, and the books on which it’s based. Much in the same way that we are now concerned about how boys’ early access to Internet porn is distorting and scripting their expectations of adult relations, how “Breaking Dawn” presents female sexuality and romantic “love” seems equally as toxic.
This penultimate film of the series commences on the eve of the wedding between lovelorn teen Bella (a recent high school grad) and her bloodsucking beau, Edward. It’s established that marriage is a compromise between them; Bella wants Edward to turn her into a vampire, but he, despite being centuries old, is a chivalrous sap, and wants to put a ring on it. They reach a détente — if she marries him, he’ll give in to both of the things she’s been begging him to do — turn her immortal and relieve her of her virginity.
In earlier “Twilight” installments, Bella’s feistiness made up for her being such a drip, but now, like the rest of the female characters, she is desperate to be possessed by a man. Kristen Stewart, who is likely out of a job once she grows too old to play sullen teens like Bella, conjures nervous half-smiles in anticipation of consummating her marriage. This is the only scene where Bella shows any real animus — pursuing her lust, despite Edward’s insistence that his passion and vampire super strength could easily overtake them both and she could die as a result. (This warning is repeated a half dozen times, in case the heavy-handed score didn’t clue you in.) Impetuous freak that she is, Bella goes for it. The tepid but lengthy sex scenes that follow cue a small exodus of (one imagines, embarrassed) young girls excusing themselves to go to the bathroom.
Still, Bella wants more — at any cost to her or the furnishings of their beachfront condo — and is denied and shamed by her husband for her desire. All the magical fantasy of their tropical and suddenly chaste honeymoon gives way to the even more fantastical realization that despite being dead for the last century or so, Edward is shooting DNA, not dust, and their holy-yet-unholy union has given it purchase in Bella’s womb.
Conveniently, the gestation of this undead life runs at 10 times the rate of a human fetus, so Bella grows grotesquely pregnant in the span of a week. This limits the “is it an immortal demon or not?” patter to a mere quarter of the film, leaving Edward only a few minutes to do a Google image search on what this misbegotten spawn may look like.
Despite that her fetus is killing her (and ruined her honeymoon), Bella is steadfast while everyone begs her to have an abortion without using the word “abortion.” As Bella wastes away, looking ghoulish and Karen Carpenter-like, she is presented as noble and beatific — she’s got a real zeal for suffering.
All the while, this baby-mama drama is broken up by various vampire vs. werewolf fights, a parade of hackneyed visual metaphors and vampires who are uniformly made up and bewigged in a manner that suggests they are competing in a drag ball once this baby reveals itself. The tension of the last half of the film rests on whether Bella and/or the baby in her belly dies (or undead-dies), climaxing in one of the most bizarre and revolting birth scenes to ever be projected on screen. But as disgusting as it may be, it’s a relief. Given that the storylines are suffused with so much supernatural camp — a shape-shifting BFF who is also a giant dog, immortal vampires upstaged by their hairpieces, telepathy — one hopes the overblown drama encourages young viewers to apply an equal amount of disbelief to the subtler parts of the film.
