Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I can't recall the last time I had this much FUN with a poorly-made movie. I honestly can't decide whether I want to give it 'one star' for how genuinely terrible it is, or 'five stars' for how enjoyable it was to be appalled by. It's a sort of tradition amongst my local friends and I to rent movies we fully expect to be bad and watch them together; often we're just bored and, by the time the ending credits roll, feeling that we just lost two hours of our lives that we shall never get back. This one, though, stands out as one of the greats. If you're new to the series, the premises is this: Bella Swan (yes, 'beautiful swan') moves from her arid Phoenix home to Forks, Washington, where she meets and falls in love with a dour and seemingly perpetually-nauseated boy named Edward Cullen. She soon discovers his secret - that he's a vampire! - by Googling "cold ones," a term she finds in a book of Native American mythology. One would expect that Googling this term would actually yield many pages pertaining to beer. Or maybe that's just me. Anyway, a very clingy and angst-ridden relationship ensues, and after playing baseball in a thunderstorm with Edward's family, Bella meets a nasty vampire named James, who immediately develops his own obsession with her. Unlike Edward, though, James wants to eat Bella. Really badly. Most of this takes place in the latter half of the movie. The first half is comprised mostly of Bella moping around her new town and exchanging silent stares with Edward. Ah, Edward. It gave me pleasure to discover exactly how much the lead actor, Robert Pattinson, despises Edward Cullun. "When I read it I was convinced Stephenie was convinced she was Bella and it was like it was a book that wasn't supposed to be published. It was like reading her sexual fantasy, especially when she said it was based on a dream and it was like, 'Oh I've had this dream about this really sexy guy,' and she just writes this book about it. Like some things about Edward are so specific, I was just convinced, like, 'This woman is mad. She's completely mad and she's in love with her own fictional creation.' And sometimes you would feel uncomfortable reading this thing..." "...the more I read the script, the more I hated this guy." Edward Cullen has a completely inconsistent personality, and Pattinson solved this by playing him as, in his own words, "as a manic-depressive who hates himself." Now, I understand some preteen girls actually find Edward's various advances upon Bella to be romantic - like admitting to sneaking into her room to watch her sleep for months before he even made an attempt to be nice to her. I'm led to wonder how some fathers would feel if they knew their young daughters admired such qualities in future boyfriends. Personally I think Edward is downright creepy, but as Pattinson apparently meant to portray him this way, kudos to Mr. Pattinson! For Bella's part, she's an unabashed Mary Sue, with every male in town falling all over himself to befriend, date, or, in one scene, gang rape her. It's Edward, however, who wins her inexplicable devotion, mainly by following her around and saying things like, "We shouldn't be friends," or, "Stay away from me!" in a low menacing voice. By the end of the movie, after lots of heaving and sighing and rushed special-effects, we're meant to believe that the two are star-crossed lovers, though they seem more like an abusive relationship in the making. With the vampire James dispatched, Edward and Bella slaver over each other's necks at prom, and James' female companion Victoria slinks away in the backdrop, doubtlessly plotting mischief. There's also a sub-plot straight from the underwhelming "Underworld" series regarding a rivalry between werewolves and vampires, but it's barely touched on in this installment. I wonder, given his public slandering of the franchise, whether Mr. Pattinson will reprise his role as Edward in the next film. A part of me is looking forward to it.