Review of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 (2011) by Jaidyn P — 27 Mar 2015

Grade: In the middle of 4/10's.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1 is the first part of the end of this massively popular franchise. The problem is this is just very poor and is among it's predecessors not good yet again, it tries hard this time there is no doubt but just too little happens in the plot to muster an interesting movie that none Twilight hardcore fans will enjoy. I felt it to be a real disappointment of a movie and here is why.

The romance which I quite like in the series is there, but way too much and the sweet element they have together is lost in the first half hour, too much darkness creeps in here. The truth is this left me with a sour taste as all and the happiness is drained out, with a nice and peaceful start you feel it may be happy and the love will become stronger than ever before, problem is it doesn't and although more the books fault than the movie, still just isn't nice to see four films into it.

The acting is as usual all the same, no one improves but to be fair no one gets worse, it just feels like Eclipse part 2. With the enhanced roles of the two members of the wolves Seth(Booboo Stewart) and Leah(Julia Jones) it just makes for even more awkward watching and they really don't bring any good acting in, just worse. What I will say is this a film that wants Taylor Lautner to step up and when he does, well he is pretty average as all but still credit to him for being a powerful performer.

I can't deny this has action at certain points and it is well done, if not cringe worthy at times but forget about it and the thrills are there anyway. I think this is missing a certain type of action and when you think a fight will happen it either doesn't at all or the scenes are so fast with the camera movements that you get lost quickly and finding who is who is impossible in such scenes.

I think with the newcomer director Bill Condon it feels different if not too depressing at times, but he still manages to firmly get it done and make the most out of some terrible things in the script. The main basis for this movie being very poor is to be honest the source material, I think it was written to work well with the end of the book so as a stand alone movie it is much worse than it could have been, and Melissa Rosenberg doesn't help with the adapting either.

I enjoyed the score if that can be considered a positive thing about this, Carter Burwell creates a loving score that works well in even the darkest moments and although uses bits and pieces from past films in the franchise, still brings in nice new pieces too. I was saying about the love before and the score does help at the beginning which is why I felt this may not be as bad as I thought it might be, but I was mistaken when it was over.

Breaking Dawn Part 1 doesn't set up the second part well and if I were waiting a year for it, I wouldn't have high expectations at all, nevertheless I still feel the book is to blame for the mishap here, not the people behind the scenes, well except Stephanie Meyer of course. Wait until the end of the credits too here, little hint at what's to come in the final film in this mixed up series.