The Big Screen | Breaking Dawn: a vampiric soap opera

When I went home for Thanksgiving, I had three goals: stuff myself on turkey and pie, finish a chapter of my thesis and see The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1. I can only imagine what you must be thinking. I've heard enough hate about Twilight from my peers to last me for centuries. But as a lover of all things vampire, Twilight's always held a soft spot in my heart, and I've made it my mission to see every film in the series despite their many flaws. Not to mention, their poor scripts, shoddy acting and excessive melodrama can often be a great source of entertainment. Breaking Dawn is no exception.

Like Warner Brothers with the Harry Potter franchise, those at Summit Entertainment decided to split the final book of Stephenie Meyer's teen vampire series into two movies.

While I am not overjoyed that I must endure this film series and all the madness it produces for another year, Breaking Dawn the book, coming in at over 800 pages, lends itself to such action, perhaps even more so than Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The plot of Breaking Dawn has a very natural stopping place in the middle.

Breaking Dawn Part 1 sees Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) and vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) finally tie the knot. After an extravagant wedding at home, the couple departs for their Brazilian honeymoon where they consummate their relationship while Bella's still a human. (So she can enjoy her honeymoon like any normal teenage bride, Bella saves her painful vampirization for later.) While Bella enjoys herself, Edward thinks it too dangerous to attempt again.

Once is enough, however, and two weeks after her wedding Bella finds herself with a half-vampire bun in the oven. The Cullens don't know what to make of Bella's pregnancy, which progresses at lightning speed, or what kind of potentially demonic creature she's carrying. The local werewolf pack, which includes Bella's best friend and former love interest Jacob (Taylor Lautner), see the baby as a threat to the society they've sworn to protect, and tensions between the vampires and werewolves escalate as Bella's health quickly deteriorates.

Pretty melodramatic, no? Sounds like a very odd mixture of Rosemary's Baby and Days of Our Lives. The quality of the script to Breaking Dawn is about as good as the other films in the series, which isn't saying much. Corny dialogue abounds and the plot often lags. And given the serious turn of the subject matter, this film does not offer as many inappropriate laughs as previous installments. But Breaking Dawn has its moments. The honeymoon sequence is enjoyable, particularly after Edward decides to reinstate his celibacy, forcing Bella to spend the rest of their vacation time playing chess and unsuccessfully attempting to seduce him.

After watching Stewart's acting consist of biting her lip for three movies, in Breaking Dawn she reveals herself to be a pretty decent actress. While many of the other actors fall flat in their character portrayal (whether that's their fault of the script's, I'm not sure), Stewart seems believable. The film once again fails to convey the splendor that is the Cullen family, who remain just anxious statues with bad hair, but Stewart—severely emaciated and with dark, hollow eyes—convinces us of just how much Bella's pregnancy threatens her life.

A thought that is only confirmed by the birth scene, or, as Roger Ebert calls it in his review, "without doubt the most blood-curdling scene of live childbirth in a PG-13 movie." My friend and I both partially covering our eyes, I turned to her and whispered, "This is worse than 127 Hours!" Horrifying to say the least.

My final barometer for evaluating a film often relies on how much I liked its music. While every installment of The Twilight Saga makes this film major roll her eyes to some extent, one of the most redeeming qualities about these films are their soundtracks. For example, the soundtrack to Eclipse, the third film in the series, featured great original music by The Bravery, Florence and the Machine, The Black Keys and Vampire Weekend. Breaking Dawn's, however, was mediocre at best. Going from mellow song to mellow song, the soundtrack doesn't have any weight.

While I continue to see the Twilight films for a vampire fix and mindless fun, I'm afraid they will never be very good movies. If that bothers you, by all means don't see Breaking Dawn. But you'll miss out on lots of giggles.