Face Off: Kristen Stewart vs Movie Goers

 
Before the Twilight saga I had never heard of Kristen Stewart.  I went into the movies not expecting much because the text that it was based in constructed Bella - the role Stewart played, as a blank slate. The idea behind Bella is for everyone (by everyone, I of course mean everyone White, straight, cisgender and able-bodied) to be able to imagine themselves as this nondescript protagonist. For much of the three Twilight movies to date, Kristen has spent her time pouting, biting her lip, stuttering and falling.  However, to be fair to Stewart, Bella was written originally as a clutz.

In New Moon she perfected what I like to call the confused running girl. At the end of the movie Edward had decided to reveal himself and she was told by Alice that he would be at the clocktower, which, by the way, was straight ahead. Kristen ran and then she stopped, ran her fingers through her hair, looked behind her and then started running again.  If she has only moments to spare, why is she stopping to make sure the audience catches a glimpse of her oh so angsty zomg, I’m all concerned face? Then she runs again, only to stop again, run her fingers through her hair AGAIN, looking angst-ridden and concerned into the camera, before finally decide that this time it’s for real.

Kristen isn’t the worst actor in the series - I’m looking at you Taylor Lautner (his abs do his acting for him), but I’m not surprised that there weren’t any Oscars handed out.  

Okay, okay, fanpoodles settle down.  I know that Stewart is only 22 and is therefore young and not nearly as experienced as other actresses. Some of the the terrible acting could have been the fault of the director right? I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt until Snow White and the Huntsman.

In Snow White and the Huntsman, she was cast alongside of Oscar winner Charlize Theron.  This should have given her a good model to follow. We should have seen some improvement. Especially given that she was working with a new director and had a character that actually had somewhat of a spine (I can only say somewhat because Snow White is still the essential special snowflake that everyone seems to love) should have lead to an improved Stewart.  Not even an exciting actress like Theron could save her from banality.

Review Snow White & The Huntsman

 

I went into this movie not expecting anything positive, and I must say that it completely lived up to my low expectations. With the exception of a few action scenes, Snow White and the Huntsman essentially remained true to the fairytale which we are all familiar with.  There was some money spent on a few pretty good special effects, particularly the troll and the time they spent in the fairyworld and it helped to distract from the piss poor acting on the part of both Kristen Stewart and  Charlize Theron.  Having watched all of the Twilight movies to date, I didn't expect Stewart to do a great job, but I was disappointed in Theron, who won an Oscar for her role in Monster. For her part, Stewart spent the majority of the film with her lip trembling - a slight twist on her customary lip biting, while staring all big and doe eyed into a camera.  A concussed penguin would have had more personality than Stewart on film. Much of the time that Theron spent on screen she was screaming which gave her a character a single angry note.

Snow White's mother wished for a daughter whose skin was as white as snow, lips as red as blood, hair as black as a ravens wings, with the strength of the rose that she pricked her finger on. Shortly thereafter Snow White was born.  All was well and good until the queen died during a harsh winter.  The king mourned his wife, until one day he was drawn out to war.  The forces of the opposition were magical and they were quickly defeated by the kings forces.  The king discovered Ravenna chained in a carriage, and was so overcome with her beauty that he married her the next day.  As they lay in bed, she told him about how men use women and suck the life out of them, just before she thrust a dagger into his heart. With the king dead, it was easy to overrun the castle and imprison Snow White.  In the years that followed, Ravenna consumed the youth of the villagers to maintain her strength -- until one day -- the mirror told her that now that Snow White had reached adult hood that she was more fair than her.  Thus began Ravenna's mission to kill Snow White.  

In order to add a twist to the story, Snow White's escape was wrapped around the idea of the people rebelling under Ravenna's oppression.  Essentially, Snow White became the chosen one that everyone adored virtually on sight, to the point of pledging their lives to her service. Even the vicious troll did not have it in his heart to kill or otherwise maim Snow White, so enthralled was he with her heart and her beauty. Snow White didn't have to do a damn thing to earn their loyalty, but be born a special snowflake. This is hardly a positive re-envisioning of the classic tale.  Her only personality trait throughout the movie was the pureness of her heart.  Do we really need another movie promoting the pureness and beauty of White womanhood? 

Merging Names, Merging Faces in Urban Fantasy

Ever since Brangelina society has taken on the most irritating habit of combining names to represent couples.  What does this irritation have to do with urban fantasy you wonder?  Well, this trend has become quite popular in urban fantasy as well.

I give you:

Ian Somerhalder (Damon)

+

Nina Dobrev (Elena)

=

Delena

and

Taylor Lautner (Jacob)

+

Kristen Stewart (Bella)

=

Jabella

And

Nina Dobrev (Elena)

+

Paul Wesley (Stefan)

=

Stelena

And

Wednesday Reboot: Twilight Eclipse

Well, Twi fans, the moment is almost here.  What better way to get ready for Friday's big debut of The Breaking Dawn Saga Part 1, than to recap Eclipse. The movie begins with Riley Biers being chased through the city by a very determined Victoria and quickly changes to Edward and Bella in a field on a beautiful sunny day. 

Though Bella is trying to study for an English final, Edward does his best to distract her, only stopping to ask her to marry him.  Bella quickly counters with "change me", and he agrees to change her if she agrees to marry him, calling it a compromise.  He tells her that where he comes from that is how people say I love you, and she counters with, "where I come from, at my age it says I just got knocked up." She follows that up by telling him that 2 out 3 marriages end in divorce, but ever quick on hes feet Edwards says, "I think you'll find the vampire/human divorce rate to be much lower."

This exchange is the first in the series, in which Bella is clearly thinking clearly.  She is absolutely write, marriage at that age is a recipe for disaster and her parents are living proof of this, the pressure that Edward continually puts her is just another example of his desire to control her.

When Bella returns home, Charlie tells her that he wants her to get some separation from Edward but in typical teenage fashion, she responds with, "he's in my life."  In a great compromise room, he agrees to end her grounding if she spends some time with her other friends, specifically Jacob, who is really hurting now. "I remember when that was you. When you needed a friend, Jake was there." 

After calling and getting now answer, Bella decides to go and visit him, only discover that Edward has purposefully disabled her truck.  "Bella, you have to understand, you're safety is everything to me." She tells him, "Jacob is not going to hurt me", but Edward responds with, "not intentionally, but the wolves have no control." She tells him that she has until graduation to Jacob but he responds with "I'm sorry" and faces forward.  So much for the spunky in control Bella.  This man has limited her movement and now seeks to control who she is friends with and how she does not see this as classic abusive behaviour and end the relationship right there is beyond me.  I suppose in Twilight world, abuse is okay as long as he says that he loves you.

Wednesday Reboot: Twilight New Moon

 

Of all three of the Twilight movies to date, New Moon is easily the most angst filled and the least tolerable.  The film begins on Bella Swan's 18th birthday.  She is upset that she is now older than Edward was at the age that he died because all she can envision is a future in which he stays young and beautiful and she ages. I don't think it was intentional but the idea of old as worthless and undesirable is ageist.  This model privileges youth or at least the appearance of youth at all costs.

At her birthday party, Bella cuts her finger causing Jasper to go into a blood lust. In order to protect her, Edward has to push Bella across the room to keep Jasper away from her, in the process hurting her even more.  When he drops her off that night, clearly the relationship between them is strained.  The next day at school, none of the Cullens are in attendance.  When Bella arrives home that afternoon, Edward is waiting for her.  He tells her that the Cullens are leaving and that she cannot go with them, and thus begins hours of Bella moping.

Even if we take into consideration that when the Cullens left that not only did Bella lose Edward, she lost Alice her friend her reaction was over drawn and ridiculous. Outside of her relationship, Bella has no reason for living, she is completely dependent upon Edward and this is not love, despite being constructed as such.  Bella goes into an extreme depression and then has nightmares in the middle of the night and awakens screaming.  Charlie her father is clearly worried and threatens to send her to live with her mother, if she does not start to come out of it.

Bella goes for a ride on a motorcycle with a shady character and she imagines Edward.  This sets her off on a path to endanger herself as much as possible for the chance to see Edward.  Bella appropriates bikes from the trash, and talks Jacob Black into fixing them up for her.  In the processes, they become very good friends, and so when he stops seeing her after he transitions to a wolf, she is hurt yet again. This tells us that Bella is absolutely incapable of being alone and being happy. Because Bella is already a blank slate, this makes her pain unrelatable and sets up a dependency state as necessary for a woman to be happy.

Robert Pattinson on Breaking Dawn’s Birth Scene and Being Seduced by Kristen Stewart

Wednesday Reboot: Twilight

 

On November 18th, Breaking Dawn will be released and the Fangs for the Fantasy crew thought it might be a good idea to review the series as a refresher.  This is actually a difficult undertaking, because so much has already been written about this series, but we will attempt to make it as fresh as possible.

For those who are unfamiliar with Twilight, I will simply say that it involves Bella Swan moving from Arizona to Forks, where she meets and falls in love with Edward Cullen.  Edward is a vampire, but he differs from other of his kind, because he survives solely on the blood of animals. The movie is largely based around their romance.

The Twilight juggernaut is aimed solely at a YA market, but it has managed to capture the imagination of adults. Bella Swan is written to be virtually a blank character, with the sole purpose of being easily identifiable, so that anyone reading the story or watching the movie, can picture themselves in her role. Unfortunately, this decision also means that she is easy to manipulate.  Edward tells her that she is like his "own personal brand of heroin" and that he has never thirsted so much for a humans blood, yet her response is that she is not afraid.  Bella continues with this position, even when he tells her that he is a monster and a murderer. 

Who doesn't run screaming at that kind of admission?  To be clear, we all have skeletons, but the idea that murder is just one of those things that is excusable, because we are dealing with a supernatural being is ridiculous.  Where are Bella's survival instincts? Instead of worrying that she could be in danger, when she meets Edward's family, she is more concerned that they won't like her.  Bella is so blank, that she might as well be as supernatural as Edward because she hardly reads as human.

Edward is that creepy stalker guy that most women want to avoid.  Charlie's behaviour towards him is almost threatening at times, but it really is cliche. Come on, cleaning his gun before meeting his daughters boyfriend.  Edward has given Charlie no reason to distrust him, and it reads more like Charlie is protecting his daughter from predatory teenage hormones. Yep, gotta keep the family vagina pure. This of course distracts from the point that Edward really and truly is dangerous. He stares at Bella like he wants to consume her continually, and he sneaks into her bedroom at night to watch her sleep.  None of this is romantic, and in fact falls into the category of needing a restraining order.  Edward is obsessed, rather than in love, and I think this point is ignored in much of this series.

Catherine Hardwicke, who directed this film, attempted to match the source material as much as possible.  This means that if you were already familiar with the book before seeing the movie, the film offered the viewer nothing new at all. It felt as though she didn't want to take risks with the story. I understand that at the time Twilight the movie was made, that the story already had a slew of fans, but that certainly does not mean that the source material was perfect - in fact, it was far from perfect. Hardwicke lost the opportunity to infuse Bella with a personality, and reduce Edward's creepy stalking behaviour.

'The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1' -- Kristen Stewart Interview