The first teaser trailer for the latest movie in the watered down “vampire” series Twilight was released this week, and I must say, I was impressed. Not impressed in the way you might think, mind you, I was just amazed that they summarized about 99% of the premise of the whole 629 page novel in under two minutes. Oh boy, a love triangle, how boldly fresh and original.
From the trailer, it’s good to know what to expect from the summer release: the same stiff acting, sappy and ineptly delivered lines, awkward cinematography and the lingering desire to punch the leads in their faces. One would think that since all the leads have since stretched their acting wings (taking a break from dooming themselves to a career of typecasting), they would, you know, make it more believable, or as believable as a world with sparkling vampires with no fangs would be.
It would seem that the first trailer of this movie did come at a most opportune of times, merely a week and a half before the release of the New Moon DVD, and soon before the release of a Twilight graphic novel (am I the only manga fan annoyed by a Twilight graphic novel?). All of this does seem to be a bit rushed though: while I do agree with the bundled releases, I think it’s all too close to the summer premiere. Maybe they’re as eager to get this whole thing over with as I am. The only foreseeable difference with this movie is that it was shot in IMAX 3D, which means we get to see Edward turn into a warped disco ball a bit better this time around.
For those of you who have been fortunate enough not to have read the books, here’s a brief summary. Bella Swan, the whiny, weak willed “protagonist” from the first two movies, realizes that she is incapable of making up her own mind, and leads on “werewolf” Jacob Black even though she is already attached at the hip to her glampire boyfriend, Edward Sparklepants, who, for some reason, proposes to her. The rest of the plot shows up drunk and incoherent to this party, and includes a group of bad guy vampires (Victoria and her minions) who want Bella dead, just like in the last two books. There’s a fourth book, so you can safely assume they fail at killing her. Sorry to get your hopes up.
It won’t be long before we see a trail of Facebook status updates proclaiming how excited she is for the upcoming release, with countdowns and pictures with their faces badly photoshopped in place of Kristen Stewart’s, and undoubtedly, Team Edward or Team Jacob splayed haphazardly on everything from posters to shirts. Hot Topic’s already limited merchandise will swell to ridiculous proportions, focusing solely on all things Twilight, just to accommodate and add to the hype.
And while I am certainly no fan of this (horrible) book series, I must admit, I am fairly excited for the last installment, Breaking Dawn, not only because it means that the death of the Twilight fad will soon follow, but because I just want to see how certain scenes (I can’t elaborate said scenes too much without giving the little plot the book has away) are played out. Until then though, Eclipse is the new movie of the moment, and, much like New Moon, I’m curious to see how they adapt 600 plus pages of overused adjectives and general fluff to film.
Part three of four comes out this June. Until then, the general populace will be subjected to continued exposure to the disease—uh, I mean, the Twilight “phenomenon”.
