The saying goes that all good things must come to an end. But what they don't say is that bad things end as well. Case in point: the series of movies based on Stephenie Meyer's Twilight novels. I'd never heard of the Twilight books prior to the first movie's release in 2008, but the media blitz surrounding the movies, along with the offensively bad quality of these cinematic adaptations, have made me vow to never read the books. All of the Twilight movies have been piss-poor, but after this review, I'll never have to watch or even think about them ever again. So let's jump into The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn ― Part 2 and get this mess over with as soon as possible.
Our movie begins where the previous one ended, with Bella Cullen (Kristen Stewart) awaking as a newborn vampire, having been turned by her new husband Edward (Robert Pattinson) in a desperate attempt to save her from death during childbirth. She quickly masters many of the new gifts and abilities that come with being a vampire, her only struggle coming in controlling the bloodlust that is natural to those of the undead persuasion. And she's far from thrilled when she learns that Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) has "imprinted" upon her days-old daughter, an involuntary reflex in which werewolves find their soulmate.
But as time passes, Bella comes to accept and overcome these problems, while her and Edward's daughter Renesmee (Mackenzie Foy) quickly matures thanks to her hybrid human/vampire heritage. Things will get a wee bit rougher for the happy Cullen family, though, as word of Renesmee's birth reaches Aro (Michael Sheen), the leader of the Volturi. Erroneously led to believe that Renesmee is an immortal child, something prohibited in vampire culture, the Volturi venture to Forks to eliminate the Cullens. Fearing a war and desperate to prove Renesmee is not who they think she is, the Cullens band together with a number of other vampire covens and the members of Jacob's werewolf clan to combat the Volturi.
It's like the brain trust behind this insipid franchise only wanted to prolong the torture of non-fans. Because instead of adapting Stephenie Meyer's final Twilight novel into one movie and getting it over and done with, they split it in half and made two. I guess they figured that if Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows can be made into two separate movies that each made a billion dollars worldwide, Breaking Dawn could try doing the same thing. I'm actually surprised they didn't take the full leap and convert the second Breaking Dawn into 3D to shake a little more money out of the audience. And it wouldn't have been so bad if either of the Breaking Dawn movies had been good. This one is a definite step-up from Part 1, but it's just so unbelievably dull that even the moments that aren't totally bad will have you wishing they'd hurry up and get along with it.
Director Bill Condon returns to for the second half of Breaking Dawn, and once again, he's making a respectable effort. He's made what is arguably the least worst out of the Twilight saga with this one, with some of the sequences actually being pretty decent. The climactic fight scene is really good too, but I'll get more into that later. Condon still still falls into some of the same traps that the rest of the movies have fallen into, however. There are quite a few sections that are boring and overlong, others are so hackneyed that one can't believe that someone would allow them to be in the finished product.
But then there's only so much Condon could do with the mediocre script and actors, and the CGI is so atrociously bad that I'm flabbergasted that anybody would allow the movie to be released with it looking the way it does. The CGI baby is especially awful, looking creepy rather than cute. I've seen behind-the-scenes pictures from the movie where baby Renesmee was represented by an ugly animatronic puppet, so the awful CGI is, in retrospect, the lesser of two evils. But the CGI baby is still really off-putting, with my first thought upon seeing it honestly being, "Oh my God, what the hell is this thing?" The one saving grace is that it didn't stick around for long.
The movie has some good elements, sure, but it's weighed down by so many of the bad ones. I find it amazing that Condon can come so close to directing what could have been the lone good entry in the Twilight saga, only to stumble over the same problems that befell three directors before him. It's like the franchise himself was daring Condon to try and make a good movie before pulling the rug out from under him as if it were Lucy Van Pelt holding a football for Charlie Brown.
But again, you can't polish a turd, and with Melissa Rosenberg once again writing the movie, that turd is pretty substantial. Thanks to Breaking Dawn being split into two movies, the material here is thinner than usual. It honestly feels like half a movie stretched out over two hours, with quite a bit of it (particularly the scenes where the Cullens start recruiting other vampires to help them fight) coming off like so much padding.
And then there's only one scene where they ever address just how weird the whole "Jacob imprinting on Renesmee" thing is. It feels rather pedophilic, and I'm not surprised that Bella would be righteously pissed off when she finds out about it. The problem is, though, that any drama that could come from it is diffused when the whole thing is dropped like a hot potato almost as soon as it happens. Jacob is pretty much treated like Renesmee's bodyguard after that and that's it. Rosenberg never delves into it or goes anywhere with it, and all it does is allow Rosenberg to resolve the Edward/Bella/Jacob love triangle in the quickest "let's sweep this under the rug" way possible.
And then there's the climax. That awful, awful climax. (Be warned, here be SPOILERS.) The movie ends with a truly awesome 10-minute brawl pitting the Cullens and Jacob's werewolves against the Volturi, and it's a sight to behold. It's the best thing to happen in all five movies, a climax that made slogging through all these movies absolutely worth it. I'm not joking, I actually did really like this sequence. But then comes the revelation that the whole thing was just a vision implanted in Aro's head. You know how mentioned Lucy, Charlie Brown, and the football earlier? That applies to the climax too. It's frustrating to see that Rosenberg wrote a movie that spends two hours establishing that the Cullens were building a gang of vampires with superpowers to fight the Volturi like they were the X-Men, only to find out that the big epic fight scene technically never happened and that the whole movie was for nothing. It's just one great big cheat that slaps everyone that watches this movie in the face. But then I've come to expect disappointment from Rosenberg, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
I'm also not surprised by how weak the cast is. For starters, Robert Pattinson seems like he's just there because of a contractual obligation. You really get the feeling that he doesn't care at all, but is happy that this is the last time he'll have to play Edward Cullen just he can get on with his life. Kristen Stewart, meanwhile, once again proves just how terrible an actress she is. Even when she's showing emotion, it feels like it's beyond her meager abilities. But then, considering how awful a character Bella is, I guess it makes sense that they'd keep an awful actress around to play her for five movies.
It's not all bad, though. Billy Burke and Michael Sheen are great, and many members of the supporting cast are decent despite not being very memorable. And while Taylor Lautner still isn't the most talented actor in the world, he's still the finest of the three leads. The guy does a decent enough job as Jacob, and he's likable despite how weird the whole "Jacob imprinting on Renesmee" thing is. Lautner's not awful, and has just enough charisma and charm to stand out from Pattinson and Stewart here. And with a little luck, he could end up becoming much better down the road. I hope that happens for his sake, because I don't think he wants any more repeats of his poorly-received 2011 flick Abduction in his future.
With this review coming to a close, I can now finally wash my hands of the Twilight saga. And it end not with a bang, but with a limp across the finish line. I've spent the last five years dreading the release of each chapter in this franchise, knowing that my masochism would kick in and I'd have to sit through them. Sure, I afforded myself the luxury of watching them on cable or downloading bootlegs off the Internet so I wouldn't have to spend any actual money on them. I just can't shake the feeling, however, that I was cheated out of something. Precious brain cells, maybe. My free time, certainly. But now that it's all over and done with, I can go back to pretending these movies never existed and I can return to watching bad movies that are actually fun, like The Room or Troll 2. Goodbye, Twilight, and good riddance.
Final Rating: **½
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