'The Twilight Saga: New Moon' Takes Box Offices and Audiences by Storm

The Twilight Saga: New Moon, the much-anticipated sequel to Twilight, is surprisingly entertaining and follows the book New Moon, written by Stephenie Meyer, much more closely than did its predecessor.

 

Director Chris Weitz (The Golden Compass) and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg (Twilight) adapted the plot from Meyer’s book while remaining true to most of the original story. Under Weitz’ direction, Kristen Stewart (Adventureland), Taylor Lautner ("My Own Worst Enemy"), and Robert Pattinson (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) are able to deliver a much more successful performance than in the original Twilight.

 

In this installment of The Twilight Saga, Edward Cullen (Pattinson) breaks up with Bella Swan (Stewart) and leaves Forks, Wash. with his vampire family, promising that "it will be as if [he’d] never existed." As Bella’s world crashes down around her, Jacob Black (Lautner), an old family friend who lives on the nearby Quileute reservation, is there to pick up the pieces.

 

As Bella and Jacob become closer, Jacob develops an unrequited love for her. When Bella reaches the point of her greatest dependency upon Jacob, he inexplicably alienates her as he tries to keep a tribal secret that he is sworn to protect – that he and his Quileute brothers turn into giant werewolves to protect humans from vampires.

 

Once Bella discovers this secret, their friendship deepens until Edward mistakenly thinks that Bella has killed herself. Edward, who always said he would die soon after Bella, flees to Italy to seek death from a powerful family of vampires, the Volturi. A race to save Edward’s life then ensues and ultimately puts Bella in an awkward position between Edward, her true love, and Jacob, her best friend.

 

The chemistry between Bella, Edward and Jacob is twisted, intoxicating and complicated to say the least, but Stewart, Pattinson and Lautner are able to bring those dynamics from the book to the big screen.

 

Part of New Moon’s overwhelming success in comparison to Twilight is the fact that Pattinson is largely not present during this second installment. This allows Lautner a larger portion of the screen time, and he gives a much better performance here than in the previous film.

 

Although his acting improved exponentially, an enormous part of Lautner’s popularity with the fans can be attributed to the 30 pounds of muscle that he packed on to retain the role of Jacob. Lautner’s shirt removal during the movie was met with loud applause and numerous high-pitched squeals of delight from "Team Jacob" and "Team Edward" fans alike.

 

Stewart’s acting also improved, along with her appearance. The make-up artists who prepared Stewart for set each day finally learned how to do her makeup properly and gave her a much prettier, yet natural appearance, which is more along the lines of how the book described the character. The onscreen chemistry present between Stewart and Lautner is apparent as Stewart’s acting is much better in scenes with Lautner than with Pattinson.

 

Pattinson continues to play his role much too creepily in comparison with his character’s persona as described by Meyer in the book. However, during the scenes that took place in Italy, this sinister portrayal of Edward is successful in illustrating the danger present to not only Edward’s life, but Bella’s and his sister Alice’s (Ashley Greene, "Desire") as well.

 

New Moon, which opened on Nov. 20, has brought in over $473 million globally. The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, the third installment in the franchise, is scheduled to be released in June 2010.