Against our better judgment, several of us ventured over to the Arclight to see New Moon last night. I know, I know – are we mad? Fortunately we met up with a very generous bartender shortly after the ticket sales guy implied that some liquid nourishment would improve our experience (Jeremy, a former bartender, taught me a neat new trick for getting more booze for your buck and it really works!) Ticket guy wasn’t kidding. Abu Ghraib sounded like more fun than this 2+ hours of cinematic torture.
I wasn’t expecting much mind you, but what I didn’t expect was yet another movie about a bunch of whiners. So, this is what gets teenage girls all hot and bothered these days? Really? I can’t imagine why anybody finds Edward, Jacob or Bella even tolerable, much less sexy. They do nothing but mope around bemoaning the fact that they aren’t happy in their relationships. Of course they’re not happy in their relationships. They’ve hooked up with a bunch of manic-depressive, boring whiners with absolutely nothing going on. They apparently have no lives outside of their stupid crushes. Edward and Bella live only for each other and can talk of nothing else. Hell, the tagline is “When you have nothing you have nothing to lose.” Can you believe that crap? So, in other words, without Edward, Bella has nothing? Man, if that isn’t a good argument for euthanasia I don’t know what is. Geesh! Get a hobby, or better yet, a life. They’re fun, you should try one.
A far more enjoyable film we caught earlier this week was An Education. Like New Moon, it too was about a relationship between a teenage girl and a pedophile, but it was actually quite well done despite a somewhat abrupt and not wholly satisfying ending. The female lead was great: strong, intelligent, and sincere. In fact, her only real fault was the inevitable naivete of being an inexperienced teenage girl. But she actually learns from her education and grows most impressively during her journey. She actually becomes a better person as a result of her dysfunctional relationship. In contrast, Bella, is only concerned that at the ripe old age of 18 she’s already “over-the-hill” – her worth clearly only based on her youthful appearance. And, assuming they follow the books, Bella’s gonna wind up a bruised up, pregnant teenage housewife right after graduation. Now that’s hot!
What gets me is how totally ignorant the author is about vampire and werewolf lore. I read interviews where she didn’t see or read any of the classic werewolf and vampire books or movies. Add to the fact that she’s a sexually repressed Mormon housewife and voila…The Twilight Saga.
New moon, old prejudice?
Ok, vampires should not sparkle at all…but it gets worse: the one black vampire is out in the sun a field with Bela at one point in the movie—he does not sparkle. Ummm, what’s the deal? Black guys can’t sparkle? Or did he just sparkle less than the others? So, this is an abstinence promoting movie with racist vampire reality? And of course, there is the whole sideline that the “dark” Indians are both shirtless (with shorts?) and lame CGI dogs, while the “pale” Europeans are sparkly, well dressed, upper class, vampires. Who made this, Disney?
I don’t quite get it either. I watched the first Twilight movie, and found it to be a boring, tepid mess. And I’ve never seen vampires so homogenized. It’s like, Disney presents Vampires! Now with more boredom! Sigh.