Review: Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 2

Bella (Kristen Stewart) is now a vampire, as Edward (Robert Pattinson) tries to teach her to control her bloodlust, as they also care for their child Renesmee. Things get a wee bit complicated when vampire Irina (Maggie Grace) reports to the Volturi about Renesmee’s existence, under the mistaken belief that she is an abomination, a vampire child, i.e. A human child who has been turned and therefore will stay as a child forever and never mature. However, she is in fact half-human by birth, and apparently that doesn’t make her a sick, freaky abomination who will bite the shit out of your neck in the middle of the night to satiate her uncontrollable bloodlust. The Volturi, led by Michael Sheen and Dakota Fanning see this as reason enough to go to war (why didn’t they just get her birth certificate?), and the Cullen clan (including Peter Facinelli, Ashley Greene, Nikki Reed, and Kellan Lutz)set out across the globe to gather forces, vampires who will testify that Renesmee is a half-human atrocity, instead of a full-blooded vampire atrocity. Taylor Lautner is still moping around as werewolf Jacob, who has apparently ‘imprinted’ on Renesmee, and although I have no idea what that means, his protestation of ‘it’s not what you think’ and Bella giving him the stink-eye, has me seriously not wanting to know.

 

It’s a shame in a way that there won’t be any more “Twilight” movies because finally after five movies, one comes along that doesn’t actually suck. Having said that, this 2012 final instalment in the film adaptations of Stephanie Meyer’s tweeny abstinence/pro-life allegories is a long, long way away from being a good film. Truth be told, the fact that “Breaking Dawn Part 1” was so hilariously stupid (easily the comedy highlight of 2011) might’ve helped make this film look more reasonable by comparison, too. But I cannot deny that this is at least a semi-competent film that certainly deserves a higher grade than the films prior to it.

 

Directed and written once again by Bill Condon (The once respected director of “Gods and Monsters” but also the appalling “Sister, Sister”) and Melissa Rosenberg (scribe of the previous “Twilight” films) respectively, I just find this worldview that Meyer has created to be so completely moronic and in a way, offensive. It defangs horror tropes in favour of dopey teen romance and then throws in conservative morality that simply doesn’t work within the vampire genre, defanged or not. As I said with the previous film, forget the endangerment of the woman giving birth, there’s something even more ludicrous going on in Meyer’s literary universe. In reality the Mormon church (which Meyer subscribes to, it is widely known) would be far more horrified by vampires (let alone human-vampire romance, let alone teen human-vampire romance) than abortion. To suggest otherwise is an insult to anyone’s intelligence. Thankfully, this film actually gets away from that side of things now that Bella and Edward have had sex and yes, had a baby. However, it does seem odd to see so many beheadings in a tween-oriented film based on a novel by an apparently devout Mormon. I guess beheadings are OK with Jesus (I must say, though, that Maggie ‘Shannon’ Grace has been begging to be decapitated- hypothetically of course- since she fucked everything up on “Lost”. Stupid, selfish cow) but I thought it was a pretty nasty and inappropriate film for teens, and I’m not even remotely prudish nor do I give a crap about teens. The only thing this film lacks is blood, otherwise it’s really violent stuff. That sends a seriously messed-up message to me, making violence seem bloodless and palatable, which it isn’t nor should it ever be. If you’re gonna be all moralistic, at least get it right. And although we get away from the abortion and abstinence crap, the film is still loaded with religious (or at least pseudo-religious) messaging, including talk of ‘witnesses’ (and I’m pretty sure one character is meant to be Moses, as you’ll see when you watch it), but mixed with the vampires and werewolves it’s just so incredibly dopey.

 

However, I’m more concerned with this damn freaky child with the dopey name of Renesmee. As shown as a baby and also in some scenes as a young girl, this kid is at least partly if not entirely CGI and it’s terrible (The CG werewolves, however, are still pretty good). I mean, this isn’t just ‘uncanny valley’ stuff, it’s the Grand Freaky Canyon! It’s particularly bad once it develops into a toddler before transitioning into a real child actress and I just can’t understand how someone thought this looked seamless. It’s a disaster. Meanwhile, there’s still some seriously stupid ideas going in here, including the fact that Bella needs to be coached by a bunch of vampires on how to act ‘human’ now that she has been turned. Um, I’m pretty sure she was a human like one movie ago, and therefore has been human much more recently than any of these other vampires. What the fuck? How am I supposed to take this shit seriously? Then again, we’re talking about a film that apparently features an actor named Booboo Stewart, and that alone had me in stitches. Is there an actor named Owie Patterson too? Aaarrrgggghmyfinger Lautner perhaps?

 

Always a source of unintentional hilarity is Billy Burke as the world’s least giveashit dad, and once again he pretty much no-sells his way through this one too. Truth be told, every actor here is too damn solemn and moody you’d swear they were all on downers. It’s especially disappointing to see the lovely Ashley Greene and Elizabeth Reaser stuck in such mopey surroundings where they really can’t do much to save it. The one exception is actually Michael Sheen. I haven’t much liked him in the previous films, but here he comes into his own and seems to be the only actor in the entire franchise who recognises the inherent camp, playing it accordingly. Everyone else thinks it’s a manic depressive version of “Romeo and Juliet”, and it’s freaking not. “Romeo and Juliet” is a masterpiece of young romantic tragedy, “Twilight” is fatuous tweeny-bop nonsense.

 

As is always the case, the period flashbacks are far more interesting than the film itself. Someone needs to make a movie about that stuff. I guess it wouldn’t have enough teenagers in it, though (So?). ***** SPOILER WARNING ***** I also have serious issues with the ending. I mean, an entire series of films about the war between vampires, humans, and werewolves that ends in a fuckin’ non-violent truce? What the fuck? A villain who simply has a change of heart? Shit, imagine if WWII were that easy! This set-piece (and there’s even more inanity to it than I’ve described) was not in the original text, and probably shouldn’t have made its way to the screen. As for the aftermath, it plays like the series finale to a teen TV drama. That’s appropriate, but I’m not being complimentary. ***** END SPOILER *****

 

Like I said, this is the best of the “Twilight” films and it won’t make my bottom 10 of the year list for a change. It’s neither as stupefyingly dull as the first two, nor as hilariously confused and batshit crazy as “Breaking Dawn Part 1”. It’s just...kinda forgettable and mediocre, really. This one certainly has the best and least monochromatic cinematography of the series, as lensed by Guillermo Navarro (“Cronos”, “The Resident”, “Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1”), so I really appreciated that.

 

Rating: C