Secondhand Reviews: "New Moon"

 If there was ever a movie that didn't need me commenting on it, this is the one. I'm a good 35 to 40 years older than the target demographic, and the wrong gender to boot. And the people who are flocking to this movie were never going to care about any negative comments about it in any movie review, anyhow. So why am I bothering? Because that's what I do, that's why. I can't see a movie and not review it. I am indeed a sick, sick man.

In part two of the "Twlight" saga, Edward and the rest of the Cullen family leave town officially because people are beginning to become suspicious of how they never seem to age, but really because Edward is afraid that Bella is always going to be in danger as long as he and the family is around. Turns out she's in danger anyhow after they leave: she begins to take some comfort and form a tentative relationship with Jacob (Taylor Lautner), who turns out to be part of the local clan of werewolves. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

Now, I am a big fan of vampires. I used to love to stay up until after midnight on Fridays and Saturdays when I was 10, 11, 12 and watch Bela Lugosi as Dracula on the late show, and I love "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" today. So you can see I was into them before they became as omnipresent as they are today. And "Twlight" has a lot of classic vampire history to live up to, which it was very, very far from doing in the first movie (I've never read any of the books). It comes a LITTLE bit closer in this sequel, but it's kind of all the more frustrating, because you get more glimpses of the movie it might have been but isn't.

One of my biggest problems with "Twlight" the movie was it's taking itself oh, so seriously at every second. "New Moon" with its new director (Chris Weitz instead of Catherine Hardwicke) shows evidence of a welcome sense of humor from time to time. Anna Kendrick in her smallish role as Bella's human friend is genuinely funny and would probably be hysterical as the lead in a full fledged comedy. Graham Greene ("Dances With Wolves"), has a supporting role in which he's allowed to show glimpses of the deadpan sense of comedy he was so good at on "The Red Green Show". And there's a wonderful sequence in which several cast members go to the local movie theatre to see a cliched action movie called "Face Punch" (terrific title), featuring a poster on which the tag line is "Let's do this!" From what we hear of the film (you don't actually see any of it), Weitz and his writers have all the ridiculous aspects of action films down cold. Unfortunately none of his has anything to do with the main storyline, which remains as somber as ever, and you're constantly getting the impression that nothing matters in the world except the relationships between the core trio.

I know that this was done to appeal to the core demographic, but it's also just absurd and ridiculous to have the werewolf pack in their human forms almost constantly shirtless. It makes absolutely no sense and just screams "pandering to the teen girls", and makes it virtually impossible to take any of what happens with those characters seriously. It would still have been difficult even if the roles were performed well... and that's another issue.

I thought that in "Twilight", Kristen Stewart was the only cast member showing any glimpses of acting talent (talent that she's since confirmed in other films such as "Adventureland"). She's still good in this one, but just like before has to struggle against weak material and sub-par dialogue to make that clear. Robert Pattinson's bland acting isn't as damaging to the film as before since his role is so much smaller, but Taylor Lautner makes up for his absence in his one-note performance in which the only thing that seems to vary is how high or low he's arching his eyebrows and how loud or softly he's snarling. There are some other quality performances, but just like Greene and Kendrick's. previously mentioned, they're by talented people whose roles are nearly invisible because more space is needed for the stars. Michael Sheen ("The Queen", "Frost/Nixon") makes me wish they would make an entire film about his character, a delightfully evil leader of the vampire royalty known as the Volturi, and Dakota Fanning continues to show how her talent is growing as she matures in her equally evil Volturi role. But again, you don't get enough of them. Give me a sequel entirely about the Volturi with both Sheen and Fanning (and somehow find roles for Greene and Kendrick in it) and I'm there, but this is a long way from that hypothetical movie.

I suppose it really doesn't matter what a movie critic says or thinks about a movie that clearly connects in such a major way with its intended audience, of which I am clearly not a part. But just because the movie is about teenagers, does that HAVE TO mean there's no need to bother making it appeal to other groups as well? After all, the early years of "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" were set in high school too, and the Buffy/Angel relationship was not all that different from Bella and Edward, and... (Oh, no, he's getting started on that damn "Buffy" again... we better stop him before he goes off on another rant...)... hey, wait a minute, what are you doing?... what are those straight jackets for?... HEY....