REVIEW - Twilight 'New Moon' Takes Cinemas By Storm!

19 November 2009

Imagine waking up to realise that you have aged 60 years but the love of your life is still a handsome, youthful man of 17.

That's how Bella Swan feels at the beginning of the second instalment in author Stephenie Meyer's Twilight Saga, New Moon.

For the uninitiated, Bella (Kristen Stewart) is going out with Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), who happens to be a 109 year old vampire who stopped ageing over 90 years ago.

Edward and his vampire family live in the small town of Forks where unlike other vampires they abstain from human blood, feeding instead off wild animals.

In New Moon, Bella begins to realise that it's not safe for her to be human anymore, especially after her birthday where a little blood almost causes Edward's vampire brother Jasper to attack.

To protect Bella, Edward decides that instead of turning her into a vampire and essentially damning her, he must leave her, causing Bella to spend months severely depressed -- until she starts hanging out with Jacob Black.

Jacob (Taylor Lautner), becomes Bella's best friend, whom she spends time fixing up some old dirt bikes with to indulge her new found rebellion.

A major heart throb in the series, 17-year-old Lautner received a collective squeal of delight when he first takes his shirt off, revealing his nicely toned chest and abs at which Lautner was forced to work extremely hard throughout filming to maintain.

The shirtless Jacob scenes leave fans excited for more, until you see Edward's first shirtless scene later in the film -- which in its pasty, scrawny comparison, disappoints!

When Bella finds out that her friend Jacob is a werewolf, you start to see some more action, including the transformations of Jacob and his wolf pack.

Despite the average special effects, the wolves are pretty scary and in general as a viewer you are so enthralled in the story you barely notice the special effects.

One thing you do notice however, is Jacob's stunningly Hollywood white teeth -- questionably too white for a guy meant to be a Native American werewolf!

Then there's Edward, whose makeup in this film leaves you wondering if he just dipped his face in a bucket of pressed powder or had been crying all night wearing cheap eyeliner.

This game of opposites between Edward and Jacob is a theme carried out through the entire series. Cold versus hot, 'good' versus 'bad', tan versus pale, buff versus slim, old versus young, safe versus fun-loving... the list goes on.

Bella is forced to leave Jacob, her pillar of strength, to go and save Edward from the cruel vampire authority The Volturi, after he races to Italy under the impression that Bella was dead and wanting to end his own life by exposing his vampire traits (in this case, the fact that vampires sparkle in the sun) to the public in the Tuscan town of Volterra.

A romantic sentiment - it's like a vampire's Romeo and Juliet, which interestingly enough is the text studied at Bella and Edward's high school earlier in the year -- how fitting.

Bella's race to Edward in this scene gets your heart pumping, building suspense for more action to come with the dangerous Volturi, including a great performance from Dakota Fanning as Jane.

By the end of this film, just as at the end of the book, the viewer is presented with two intriguing characters, but in the end Bella can only be with one of them. Vampires and werewolves do not get along -- in fact werewolves are the only creatures that can kill a vampire. Jacob is like an antidote to Edward, his warmth to Edward's icy touch.

So who will Bella choose? Only readers of the following two books in the series, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn will know for sure.

I thought New Moon was an amazing film that thrilled the crazy fans in their seats and left others leaving the cinema with a smile on their face, closely followed by a confused stare that means they could only be thinking one thing -- "do I want to be Team Edward or Team Jacob?!"

By Kate Miller
The Take 40 Team