The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part One (2011)
Starring Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor Lautner
Directed by Bill Condon
This is probably not a popular opinion, but I think Breaking Dawn - Part One is the best Twilight movie to come out yet. However, don't let that praise fool you. It's still a movie with one of the silliest concepts imaginable and this is the most foolish segment of the series yet. However, there's part of me that feels like everyone knew they were dealing with utter ridiculousness and gave into the absurdity rather than trying to mask it.
For you see, the first part of the inexplicably divided Breaking Dawn starts off with the wedding of human Bella (Kristen Stewart) to vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) and director Bill Condon wastes no time getting to the proceedings. We get to visit with characters from past Twilight movies (including a forty-five second cameo from Anna Kendrick who steals the movie in her scene) and then we just jump right to the honeymoon on a private isle off the shores of Brazil. Bella and Edward consummate their marriage which leaves Bella happy, but Edward upset because his uncontrollable animalistic tendencies rear their ugly head whilst in the midst of sex and he not only literally breaks the bedposts, but bruises his darling bride. The two mope around the fancy honeymoon house because they're seemingly sexually incompatible for the time being -- Bella has yet to determine when she'll step over to the vampire side of things, you see. All this is cheesy enough, but then Bella starts throwing up and she realizes that after fourteen days on the island and following a nice product placement for Tampex that she's late which must mean that she's pregnant. Mere seconds after coming to that conclusion, she feels the baby kicking inside of her. But wait! Vampires and humans can't have babies together, can they? And if they can, what the hell is growing inside Bella? A vampire? A human? One thing is for certain -- whatever it is it's certainly going to be the palest baby ever to come out of a mother's womb if Bella and Edward's genes have anything to do with it. All that and I didn't even mention the werewolf Jacob (Taylor Lautner) whose fellow lycanthropes are fed up with vampires taking humans for brides -- hell, that's what the werewolves want!
The whole thing is utterly ridiculous with some of the most inane dialog around...but it's kinda fun. I mean, even writing that ludicrous summary, I couldn't help but smile about the whole thing. Sure, I'm sick and tired of the whole premise of this godawful series. But at least in Breaking Dawn the stupid subplots about European vampires wanting to bring an end to the Cullen clan are brushed aside and the focus sits squarely on the insanely idiotic dynamic of human-vampire sexual relations. Dare I say it, but Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson weren't as annoying as in past movies and I think new director Bill Condon actually managed to pull average performances out of them (which is more than I can say from past directors). Condon also makes the film rather nice to look at and has a moderately deft hand at pacing the flick out...although in the grand scheme of things, I'm sure these two Breaking Dawn pictures could have easily been condensed into one without any problems at all.
The end credits scene alluded to the fact that the second film will shift focus to more of a battle between the Cullens and this aforementioned European vampire group headed by Michael Sheen...and this will inevitably bore me to no end. But, Part One of Breaking Dawn surprisingly managed to hit that "so bad it became laughable" point that at least made the whole thing not as tedious to watch as the other movies in the series.
For you see, the first part of the inexplicably divided Breaking Dawn starts off with the wedding of human Bella (Kristen Stewart) to vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) and director Bill Condon wastes no time getting to the proceedings. We get to visit with characters from past Twilight movies (including a forty-five second cameo from Anna Kendrick who steals the movie in her scene) and then we just jump right to the honeymoon on a private isle off the shores of Brazil. Bella and Edward consummate their marriage which leaves Bella happy, but Edward upset because his uncontrollable animalistic tendencies rear their ugly head whilst in the midst of sex and he not only literally breaks the bedposts, but bruises his darling bride. The two mope around the fancy honeymoon house because they're seemingly sexually incompatible for the time being -- Bella has yet to determine when she'll step over to the vampire side of things, you see. All this is cheesy enough, but then Bella starts throwing up and she realizes that after fourteen days on the island and following a nice product placement for Tampex that she's late which must mean that she's pregnant. Mere seconds after coming to that conclusion, she feels the baby kicking inside of her. But wait! Vampires and humans can't have babies together, can they? And if they can, what the hell is growing inside Bella? A vampire? A human? One thing is for certain -- whatever it is it's certainly going to be the palest baby ever to come out of a mother's womb if Bella and Edward's genes have anything to do with it. All that and I didn't even mention the werewolf Jacob (Taylor Lautner) whose fellow lycanthropes are fed up with vampires taking humans for brides -- hell, that's what the werewolves want!
The whole thing is utterly ridiculous with some of the most inane dialog around...but it's kinda fun. I mean, even writing that ludicrous summary, I couldn't help but smile about the whole thing. Sure, I'm sick and tired of the whole premise of this godawful series. But at least in Breaking Dawn the stupid subplots about European vampires wanting to bring an end to the Cullen clan are brushed aside and the focus sits squarely on the insanely idiotic dynamic of human-vampire sexual relations. Dare I say it, but Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson weren't as annoying as in past movies and I think new director Bill Condon actually managed to pull average performances out of them (which is more than I can say from past directors). Condon also makes the film rather nice to look at and has a moderately deft hand at pacing the flick out...although in the grand scheme of things, I'm sure these two Breaking Dawn pictures could have easily been condensed into one without any problems at all.
The end credits scene alluded to the fact that the second film will shift focus to more of a battle between the Cullens and this aforementioned European vampire group headed by Michael Sheen...and this will inevitably bore me to no end. But, Part One of Breaking Dawn surprisingly managed to hit that "so bad it became laughable" point that at least made the whole thing not as tedious to watch as the other movies in the series.
The RyMickey Rating: C
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