Movie Reviews: The Twilight Saga - Eclipse

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

Why do I keep doing this to myself? Mostly to have something to complain about here. And for that Eclipse delivered. In barrel loads.

First off...you know what? I'm not going to do it. Making fun of Twilight is too easy. It's a wretched, over the top story about a love sick Mary-Sue, told in a fashion that would make purple prose embarrassed. We all know it's basically porn in disguise. (Why do I get the feeling that word is going to net me a ton of page views? Happened with my webcomic all those years ago -_-). The movies actually manage to improve on the original books, which really isn't saying much as excrement that has had a few gritty pieces picked out to make it smoother is still excrement. And yes, I do like using big words. It makes me feel smart. Like a high school student writing an essay.

Instead, I'm going to review what this movie did right. Keep in mind, it's still a Twilight movie, and as such is terrible by default. But I think a different spin to this review is called for.


First off, the acting has actually improved. It isn't going to win any awards, though I think Robert Pattison deserves at least a consolation prize for not showing up to the set drunk. Stoned out of his mind however is another mater, so I'll be taking that prize if you please. Surprisingly enough, Kristen Stewart's acting has actually improved. She's still horrible, but she's not Twilight and New Moon horrible.

The script cut out a ton of material from the books, Edward only disables her car once in the movie, as opposed to all the lengths he goes to in the book to keep Bella away from Jacob. This alone makes the character much, much more likable. I still don't like him because I remember what his actual character is, but for the sake of the movie his controlling personality is toned down a lot, which I think does the movie credit.

The action scenes are...okay. I mean compared to what we got in the last two movies (aka/ none) this movie is freaking Diehard. I would have preferred a lot more action, but this is Twilight, I knew what I was getting into when I walked into that theater.

Compared to the first two movies the music has improved a lot. Which isn't surprising, as it was composed by Howard Shore. Please allow me a moment to mourn.

How did they get Howard Shore!? Has he not been getting enough work since opting out of scoring King Kong? Was he really this desperate? Either way, the music is actually quite good, what little bit of it they allowed into the movie. Most of the time it was the typical emo fare, but the few times that Shore's score actually showed its face the movie started to resemble something epic, musically at least. Of course this would be invariably ruined, though there was one scene in particular that I thought fit the music fairly well. Of course Howard Shore is a pretty good composer, even if I only really know his work from the Lord of the Rings. It's still one of my favorite sets of soundtracks, and I can tell he has talent. If I didn't know it before this, then his work for this movie convinced me. If he's able to take something like Eclipse and give it a respectable soundtrack, then I'm convinced the man is a genius.

Just as a final note, I was glad that the character Leah got at least a little bit of screen time. With how often she gets shafted in the books she's easily the most sympathetic character to me. I guess you can say that I relate to her after reading the books?

As you all know pictures say a thousand words, and I think that there is one image that effectively describes the rest of this movie.

Soft Core Porn.

Because you hadn't noticed yourself already.

Well, I know I'm a little behind on the Fairy Tail reviews. I have the remaining two almost entirely written. I'll get them up soon. Keep in mind, that chronologically they'll appear before this, just because I have drafts saved and don't want to change them. Not that anyone is really reading this right now, so by the time somebody does read it, it'll all be in order anyway.

For the record, my mostly positive review aside, this movie was in fact pretty wretched, but I just felt that went without saying.