More action, vampires, wolves and half-naked Native Americans fueled audience’s obsessions during the premiere of The Twilight Saga: New Moon. New Moon is based on the second installment in Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight Series of the same name.
Chris Weitz, the director, did a fantastic job introducing the love triangle between Edward (Robert Pattinson), Bella (Kristen Stewart) and Jacob (Taylor Lautner). New Moon is the first time audiences encounter the Volturi, the vampire police so to speak, and catch a real glimpse into their power over all vampires. By far the best line of the movie was when Jane (Dakota Fanning) quips, “This may hurt a little.”
Granted there was more of a budget for this movie, within New Moon there was ten times more action than Twilight. The movie was action-packed from the start when Jasper attacks Bella over a little blood spilt, to the wolves ripping apart a vampire, and then, finally, ending with the destructive brush between Edward and the Volturi.
New Moon followed the book much better than Twilight did. Weitz took the series to a whole new level with his movie adaptation of the book. The computer-generated images in this film were out of this world. The wolves alone could have kept this movie afloat. Weitz uses the transformation from human to wolf as an added value, which makes it one of the best features the movie has to offer audiences.
New Moon is possibly one of the first films to create this type of realistic transition on screen. During one scene in the movie a member of the werewolves, Paul, gets angry and transforms into a wolf as a reaction to being slapped by Bella. Jacob, in turn, reacts by transforming within a split second in front of Bella. Letting the “wolf” out of the bag, so to speak, about his being a wolf. All in all it results in a thrilling brawl and a sudden destruction of the forest between the two of them.
New Moon was great; however, there were a few discrepancies between the movie and the book, which Twilighters will be sure to notice. One of the problems with the movie lies with Pattinson’s acting. As in Twilight, Pattinson’s acting is severely lacking in New Moon and it makes the chemistry, if there is any, between Edward and Bella difficult to watch.
The film’s saving grace is Lautner’s performance, which acts as a balancing act for Pattinson’s role throughout the entire movie. Not only did Lautner bulk up for the part, which made him appeasing to watch, but his acting also took away from the lack of emotion on Pattinson’s part. All in all, this makes the chemistry between Jacob and Bella nail biting.
Twilight’s diverse, overwhelmingly humungous fan base skyrocketed New Moon to the third largest opening weekend ever, topped only by The Dark Knight and Spider Man 3. If this is any indication of the popularity and general enjoyment of the movie to the common viewer, fans of Twilight series and Twilight (2008) should flock to the theatres just like everyone else.