The first 10 seconds of the movie is a warning to anyone who prefers watching a movie in peace to get out of the theatre while you still can. The fang-girls are sure to drive you completely mad with their high-pitched exclamations throughout the entire movie. As proof of the extent of their fervour, during the Nov 25 premiere, they even screamed and applauded when a shot of a moon appeared on screen and faded away to reveal the title of the movie, New Moon.

Cue: “Gasp! Ahh! Oh my god! Oh my god!”

You can only imagine what their responses were during the more dramatic scenes of the movie or whenever there’s a shot of leading men-boys Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) or Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) with their shirts off (and there were plenty of them). A word of advice – earplugs.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 2 years, you’d know that the Twilight saga is based on a series of young-adult vampire romance novels written by mum-turned-millionaire, Stephanie Meyer.

They revolve around Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart), the hapless heroine in the series who falls in love with the charming but reclusive vampire Edward Cullen within a span of 100 pages in the first book, featuring 2 characters in the most clichéd love story of all time.

4 books and over 85 million copies sold later, the first film adaptation of the Twilight saga hit the cinemas in 2008 and made almost US$385 million (S$532.8 million) in gross revenue, as calculated by Box Office Mojo and garnered more than a dozen awards, notably Teen Choice Awards and MTV Movie Awards. New Moon looks to do even better than its predecessor as a money-maker, with a whopping US$72.7 million, according to Variety.com, in box office takings on the opening day of Nov 20 alone.

Now that amount of money, Bella, would be worth giving up your life and soul for, and not some fickle vampire boyfriend and his family who leave town so as not to jeopardize your life any further, resulting in a pity party over the next 3 months.

Just to catch hallucinatory glimpses of her ex-lover, who can’t help but appear to protect her, Bella does reckless stunts that endanger her life, including jumping on the back of a stranger’s motorcycle. This breaks the heart of Jacob, her childhood friend and closet werewolf, who has fallen in love with her.

For people completely new to the series, it’s important to note that Twilight, isn’t something you should take seriously. Even the various references to Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet in saluting a pair of doomed lovers, simply sets up a parallel structure where Edward, who mistakenly believes Bella to be dead, tries to kill himself the only way a vampire can, by turning himself over to the Volturi (the vampiric governing body).

Instead, to enjoy your Twilight experience, you should take the series for what it is – pure entertainment; romance, drama, action, the paranormal and let’s not forget, comedy, which is especially true in New Moon.

In a way that’s completely unpremeditated, this $50-million feature film appears to be a parody of itself, with certain scenes appearing to have been deliberately exaggerated for comedic effect. One example is a scene of Edward walking towards a starry-eyed Bella in… wait for it… slow-motion, with the wind in his hair and a smile on his handsomely made-up pale face. Speaking of their makeup, he and the Cullens still look like they’ve eaten a ton of cherries before each scene, resulting in crimson berry lips, which look really freakish on their chalky faces, something they should really work on for the next installment.

Another mistake in this 130-minute homage to tragic young love is that it caters more to those who have read the books. It was lacking in proper scene transitions and the sappy dialogue left much to be desired. In fact, the million declarations of love Edward says to Bella are just too cheesy and completely cringe-worthy. One such example would be: “Bella you give me everything just by breathing.” Gag. This suggests either a lack of imagination, or a slavish loyalty to the novels on screenwriter Melissa Rosenburg’s (Step Up ) part.

This shortcoming is well compensated by new director Chris Weitz (The Golden Compass), who did a better job with cinematography and the special effects, than his predecessor Catherine Hardwicke. This was most evident when it came to the animation of the fearsome werewolves, who completely stole the show, whether on 4 legs or 2.

Taylor, who buffed up specially for this role, looked fantastic with his impeccable abs and pecs enhancing his performance, easily making him the best and most watchable of the 3 main actors. Kristen was mumbling and stuttering through most of her lines, as usual, and Robert, well, he has perfected the art of scowling and brooding, but at the expense of displaying any other emotion on his gorgeous face, which is a pity, really.

Some readers of the books are also likely to be disappointed by the film’s downplaying of the scene where Bella and Edward reunited and came in contact with the Volturi, and Alice Cullen (Ashley Greene), which was a rather important one in the book. In the acting department, Michael Sheen as the vampire elder Aro was too dramatic and felt out of place with his wooden compatriots. They’d have done well to understudy award-winning young actress Dakota Fanning, whose turn as vampire tormentor Jane was first-rate and impactful even with the miserly 10 minutes of screen time she was given.

Another saving grace for New Moon was the haunting score, which fit the sombre mood of the film perfectly, written by Alexandre Desplat who had previously worked with director Chris Weitz on The Golden Compass. The soundtrack produced by music supervisor Alexander Patsavas, featuring artists like Death Cab for Cutie, Muse and The Killers, was also very engaging. You could say that with the overwhelmingly mawkish lines the actors had to deliver, they needed all the help that they could get.

The blockbuster ends with a ridiculously underhanded, cliff-hanger, which will leave many Twi-hards begging for more and salivating for the next installment in the saga, Eclipse, which is scheduled to be out next year.

But for now, the cycle has just begun for New Moon (no pun intended), and there’s no point in avoiding the madness. There’s absolutely no shame in being curious about this craze. Just bow your slightly embarrassed face, grab on tight to your ticket, and follow the millions of other self-conscious people into the cinemas to catch the biggest film of 2009.

As the saying goes, “If you can’t beat them, join them”.

All images courtesy of  Shaw Organisation

Release Details:

Opens: Dec 3
Duration: 130 min
Language: English
Rating: PG
Genre: Drama
Director: Chris Weitz
Cast: Kristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner, Robert Pattinson

Cover your ears, take cover. Save yourselves from the high-pitched squeals of pre-pubescent fangirls screaming “Edward! Edward!”

If you haven’t caught on to the latest craze in the young adult-fantasy literary world since Harry Potter, Twilight, the first of 4 books, is about a 17-year-old girl who falls in love with a century-old vampire (who coincidentally looks 17 himself).When Isabella Swan decides to move from sunny Arizona to Forks, where the sun doesn’t seem to ever shine, she meets an Adonis by the name of Edward Cullen. With his cold, black eyes and stoic face, Edward seems completely put off by Bella and her presence.

But little does she know, Edward harbours a dangerous secret and they begin a relationship that probably shouldn’t exist in the first place.

As a novel, Twilight seems no different from other fantasy- romance novels.

It screams cliché at every turn of the page.

A clumsy, helpless heroine who needs saving from her vampire of a boyfriend in almost every chapter doesn’t really give you a compelling need to read on.

But strangely enough, Twilight, seems to have created a phenomenon that has its readers begging for more. Though the plot isn’t exactly the most original, Stephanie Meyer’s characters are interesting enough and their development in this novel leaves readers to question, “What happened there?” and “How could that happen?”. The irresistible effects of this dark romance haven’t gone unnoticed, just ask any female fan.

Being a New York Times Best Seller, the novel has realistic (though cheesy) dialogue and subtle humour in its favour.

In fact, the demand for the Twilight Saga is so popular right now, a movie adaptation is already out with great success as well.

With its just as cheesy plot and over-the-top interpretation of Edward as the Byronic hero (imagine Batman as a vampire in love), Twilight may not be your first pick when you enter the bookstore but no one can argue with its cult status when the American Library Association names it “Top Ten Books for Reluctant Readers”.

If you’re thinking of getting this book for your girlfriend for Christmas, it’s probably not a bad idea if she’s into the romance genre (and if she hasn’t already read it). Ladies, you just might want to get something else for your boyfriends because while he might just be curious about it in a “just-what-has-he-got-that-I-don’t” way, there really is just too little action and too much Edward in there for them.

This book is available in all major bookstores.

ISBN: 190423365

This piece is part of the UrbanWire’s Christmas New-Year supplement.

Well if you understood just what exactly I’m getting at up there, you’d be thinking “Oh give me the details on how to get my hands on those Twilight premiums already!”

That’s right, we’re calling out to fans of the latest movie-novel craze in town this Christmas season.

How to win

5 lucky UrbanWire readers stand to win a Movie Premium Set from Shaw Organisation. Each set consists of the following: (below, clockwise direction) Twilight A2 poster, mug, and US poster of the movie itself.

Simply answer the following question and email the correct answer with your full name, NRIC number and contact number to contest.urbanwire@gmail.com for your chance to win a set.

“Who is Isabella Swan’s love interest and what is he?”

This contest ends on Dec 31, 2008 and is applicable to Singaporeans/PR only.

It’s been a crazy month. My absent column two weeks ago was due to a technical glitch – the column just never showed up on the site. Actually, the dog ate the column. No, that’s old news. Try this – I was stuck at the airport in Thailand.

Okay, I confess. I was engrossed reading Twilight. Phew. I have to get it out of my bloody (sorry I can’t resist the pun) system. I know. I’m a sucker (another pun intended) for teenybopper stuff but I wanted to understand the fuss behind the vampire romance novel. Note the movie and millions of schoolgirls will be out in full force on Dec 18 in Singapore. My verdict? The novel sucks (last pun I promise) you right in so beware if you’re one of those increasing demographic who doesn’t read books anymore. Shame on you.

What else was on the pop culture radar of late besides the Twilight and Edward Cullen mania? Hollywood goes into high gear for the awards season with its slew of potential Oscar-nominated films for self-important critics’ consideration. The buzz lies with the late Heath Ledger for a posthumous nomination and even an award for his dark Joker role in The Dark Knight.

And just to bring this news closer to home, Singapore’s official entry for the Oscars is the Eric Khoo’s film My Magic. Actually I just wanted to use the news to take a dig at local films. No offence to My Magic, which was great and essentially a story about a father relating to his estranged son through the wonders of magic.

It’s the other movies I’m lamenting about. I cannot comprehend the hype over The Wedding of the Year, a movie about the wedding of the year between Fann Wong and Christopher Lee. A surreal movie about the couple’s fake wedding when the off-screen real wedding takes place months after the fake one? I’m confused. I guess other couples do photo shoots in Botanic Gardens or Bali (got budget) for keepsake but this A-list couple gets a movie. Life is unfair.

In other pointless pop culture news – Madonna divorces Guy Ritchie and pretends to be just friends with baseball player Alex Rodriguez. Former Felicity star and pink power ranger Amy Jo Johnson gives birth to her first child (Amy Jo Who Again? Told you it’s pointless news). Oprah denies hoping to work for Barack Obama’s administration although I think the double O combination will induce the big O among women worldwide. Britney Spears and Jay Chou release new albums. I don’t see the link between the two except they both don’t like to wear underwear very much. I’m not making this up.

And there you have it, another crazy two weeks ahead. Here’s an early Christmas present to get you into the mood to survive the last-minute shopping and surreptitious re-gifting for the gift exchange: it’s the link to Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show 2008.

Cheers.

Ronald Wan was a former editor at UrbanWire. He was laid off for watching VS Fashion Show too many times during lectures.

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