That's what you dream about? Being a monster?

Twilight

(2008)

The obsession with this series may be mystifying to an outsider, but this first installment isn't actually terrible, even if it's the polar opposite of Joss Whedon's irony-first take on vampire lore. Actually, that may be in its favour since there's no accusations of plagiarism to level.

Catherine Hardwicke generally does a good job playing up the teen love frisson and awkwardness, whilst Kristen Stewart is delivers a performance that is far superior to the material she's working with and which as a result makes the film seem like it has more substance than it does. Robert Pattison is much less effective, all moody pouts and stares - but I'm sure that's what the teeny (and not so teeny) girls are invested in, so he probably does the required job. Put it this way, he makes David Boreanaz look deep and multi-layered.

Actually, scratch what I said about it not ripping-off Whedon; Ashley Greene's somewhat unhinged, prophecy girl vamp is clearly lifted wholesale from Drusilla. It's a shame Greene has so little screen time, because she, and the rest of the vamp extended family, are far more interesting than the rather pedestrian burgeoning love storyline (there's even one vamp doing an Edward Scissorhands impression, wandering around like he's soiled himself and hoping no one will notice). Peter Facinelli, who has spent a decade in bit parts, is also strong as the patriarch of the family.

Meanwhile, the werewolf anti-vamp factionalism of the Native American population of the small town is nicely portrayed; this aspect, and the sodden, rain swept forested landscape recall early series of The X-Files (made me quite nostalgic, even though that first series werewolf episode is desperately dull) and there's an effective capturing of the beauty of the rural Washington locale. Additionally, Carter Burwell's score adds immeasurably to the overall mood.

Less effective is the third act obsessive nasty vampire who makes even the most hackneyed examples from Buffy look original. Some of the effects sequences aren't so hot either (although Hardwicke makes some of the body language and underplaying very effective). Also, a word for the producers' desire to rejuvenate 24 villains, since Nina Myers turns up as Stewart's mum and Kim's second season pyscho babysitter dad plays Stewart's father.

***

Comments

You're not only wrong. You're wrong at the top of your voice.

Bad Day at Black Rock (1955)
I’ve seen comments suggesting that John Sturges’ thriller hasn’t aged well, which I find rather mystifying. Sure, some of the characterisations border on the cardboard, but the director imbues the story with a taut, economical backbone.

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Marriage Story (2019)
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Vampire Academy (2014)
My willingness to give writer Daniel Waters some slack on the grounds of early glories sometimes pays off (Sex and Death 101) and sometimes, as with this messy and indistinct Young Adult adaptation, it doesn’t. If Vampire Academy plods along as a less than innovative smart-mouthed Buffy rip-off that might be because, if you added vampires to Heathers, you would probably get something not so far from the world of Joss Whedon. Unfortunately inspiration is a low ebb throughout, not helped any by tepid direction from Daniel’s sometimes-reliable brother Mark and a couple of hopelessly plankish leads who do their best to dampen down any wit that occasionally attempts to surface.

I can only presume there’s a never-ending pile of Young Adult fiction poised for big screen failure, all of it comprising multi-novel storylines just begging for a moment in the Sun. Every time an adaptation crashes and burns (and the odds are that they will) another one rises, hydra-like, hoping…

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Django Unchained (2012)
(MINOR SPOILERS) Since the painful misstep of Grindhouse/Death Proof, Quentin Tarantino has regained the higher ground like never before. Pulp Fiction, his previous commercial and critical peak, has been at very least equalled by the back-to-back hits of Inglourious Basterds and Django Unchained. Having been underwhelmed by his post Pulp Fiction efforts (albeit, I admired his technical advances as a director in Kill Bill), I was pleasantly surprised by Inglourious Basterds. It was no work of genius (so not Pulp Fiction) by any means, but there was a gleeful irreverence in its treatment of history and even to the nominal heroic status of its titular protagonists. Tonally, it was a good fit for the director’s “cool” aesthetic. As a purveyor of postmodern pastiche, where the surface level is the subtext, in some ways he was operating at his zenith. Django Unchained is a retreat from that position, the director caught in the tug between his all-important aesthetic pr…

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I was vaguely familiar with the title, not because I knew much about Jordan Belfort but because the script had been in development for such a long time (Ridley Scott was attached at one time). So part of the pleasure of the film is discovering how widely the story diverges from the Wall Street template. “The Wolf of Wall Street” suggests one who towers over the city like a behemoth, rather than a guy …

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Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (2019)
(SPOILERS) My initial reaction to Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood was mild disbelief that Tarantino managed to hoodwink studios into coming begging to make it, so wilfully perverse is it in disregarding any standard expectations of narrative or plotting. Then I remembered that studios, or studios that aren’t Disney, are desperate for product, and more especially, product that might guarantee them a hit. Quentin’s latest appears to be that, but whether it’s a sufficient one to justify the expense of his absurd vanity project remains to be seen.

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Atomic Blonde (2017)
(SPOILERS) Well, I can certainly see why Focus Features opted to change the title from The Coldest City (the name of the graphic novel from which this is adapted). The Coldest City evokes a nourish, dour, subdued tone, a movie of slow-burn intrigue in the vein of John Le Carré. Atomic Blonde, to paraphrase its introductory text, is not that movie. As such, there’s something of a mismatch here, of the kind of Cold War tale it has its roots in and the furious, pop-soaked action spectacle director David Leitch is intent on turning it into. In the main, his choices succeed, but the result isn’t quite the clean getaway of his earlier (co-directed) John Wick.

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Blake's 7 4.12: Warlord

The penultimate episode, and Chris Boucher seems to have suddenly remembered that the original premise for the series was a crew of rebels fighting against a totalitarian regime. The detour from this, or at least the haphazard servicing of it, during seasons Three and Four has brought many of my favourite moments in the series. So it comes as a bit of a jolt to suddenly find Avon making Blake-like advances towards the leaders of planets to unite in opposition against the Federation.

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2 Guns (2013)
(SPOILERS) Denzel Washington is such a reliable performer, that it can get a bit boring. You end up knowing every gesture or inflection in advance, whether he’s playing a good guy or a bad guy. And his films are generally at least half decent, so you end up seeing them. Even in Flight (or perhaps especially in Flight; just watch him chugging down that vodka) where he’s giving it his Oscar-nominatable best, he seems too familiar. I think it may be because he’s an actor who is more effective the less he does. In 2 Guns he’s not doing less, but sometimes it seems like it. That’s because the last person I’d ever expect blows him off the screen; Mark Wahlberg.

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