If there was ever a doubt as to the staying power of The Twilight Saga, New Moon’s record-breaking twenty-four hour return of $72.7 million at the box office on Friday (and upward of $140 million over the course of the weekend), well, eclipsed those fears.
Fans of Stephenie Meyer’s book will be happy: Chris Weitz’s film adaptation of the second entry in the series is faithful to the author’s vision—so much so that she recently broke her own rule and made a rare public appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show to extol its virtues. The basic storyline goes something like this: When Edward makes the selfless decision to remove himself from Bella’s life, she is left supremely depressed and plagued by nightmares. She shuns her friends and family for months, only beginning the process of reconnecting with people when her father threatens to send her to go live with her mother in Florida, which is a far cry from Forks, Washington. Her first attempts at reestablishing relationships with her girlfriends are painfully awkward (“It’s Bella…Bella Swan,” she says by way of a phone greeting. How many Bellas can there be?), but you never doubt that they will take her back--after making her sweat a bit first, of course.
And then there’s Jacob.
If Twilight was about Edward, New Moon is very much Jacob’s story. When Bella shows up at his house after school one day with two bikes that need fixing up, he’s more than happy to oblige. After all, it’s an excuse to get close to her now that “the bloodsucker” is out of the way. Only he’s not. While Edward’s physical presence is gone, his memory has become Bella’s obsession. And she quickly learns that acting recklessly is a way to bring him back, though you never know quite whether her visions are real or delusions. (What they really are is the filmmaker’s clever way of increasing Rob Pattinson’s presence in the movie, as his character is very much minimized in the book.) As Jacob becomes increasingly frustrated with Bella’s careless actions, it becomes clear that he, too, has a secret that he’s not telling—one that causes him to push Bella away.
Jacob’s betrayal coupled with Edward’s disappearance drives Bella to make the fateful decision to jump off a cliff. (Whether this was the ultimate adrenaline rush or something more is up for debate.) While she nearly dies in the angry waters, Jacob rescues her at the last second, pulling her to safety and breathing life into her—a metaphor for his purpose in the story if there ever was one. But Edward thinks that Bella is dead (as does his sister, Alice, whose visions have failed her), and so he makes the decision to turn himself into the Volturi. When they turn him away, he is determined to expose himself as a vampire during a public ceremony, knowing that such a deed would result in his death. When Alice shares this knowledge with Bella, an international race against time ensues, with Italy serving as the backdrop.
Much of the conflict in New Moon is internal, though, and so Kristen Stewart has the burden of bringing Bella’s torment to life—which she does through crying, raging, and sulking. (The fact that it’s nearly constantly raining is also a nice reminder of the psychological storm. But it is Washington, after all…) Another notable aspect of the movie is its seeming objectification of its male characters--how’s that for role reversal?—who spend much of the movie shirtless. (The fact that tween girls across the country are literally gasping and fawning and screaming things like "yummy" when Taylor Lautner first exposes his man-cans is slightly disturbing, no?) While the book makes mention of Jacob’s newly jacked up physique, the film parades it like a banner.
Still, the movie knows its audience and delivers what they have come to expect: romantic intrigue, supernatural suspense, and brooding (not so) bad boys. Stephenie Meyer herself proclaimed that the scenes created by Weitz to flesh out the film were some of her favorites, which is a great endorsement as to its overall commitment to her book. While detractors will find much to take issue with—including a cliffhanger ending that is either brilliant or underwhelming, depending on how you look at it—New Moon’s box office triumph is testament to there being something more than magic at work…
***
Related articles from Hartford Books Examiner:
Stephenie Meyer talks fifth Twilight book, Midnight Sun, and more
Stephenie Meyer to talk New Moon on Oprah--and requests your questions
Twilight author Stephenie Meyer: Hero or villain?
Twilight parody to be released in November
Comments