'Twilight' review

Cam Gigandet and Robert Pattinson (Credit: Summit)

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New-gal-in-school Bella (Kristen Stewart) becomes infatuated with Edward (Robert Pattinson), the palest kid in class who never eats, has no friends and an apparent staring problem. (Sounds like quite the heartbreaker, no?) Turns out Edward's an immortal vampire—the townspeople are awfully slow to pick up on his family's several warning signs—and insists he must stay away from Bella or risk giving into his temptation to kill her. Making matters worse is a trio of evil vampires who don't seem to like it when humans hang with their kind.

The buzz: Adapting the first book in author Stephanie Meyer's wildly popular series, director Catherine Hardwicke's ("Thirteen") film has so much anticipation that advance ticket sales were enough to green-light the sequels, Pattinson is mobbed everywhere he goes and, presumably, all babies born this week will come into the world with an opinion on who is the series' hottest character. To that end, a note to fans of the novels who are sharpening their fangs for anyone who speaks badly of "Twilight": This is a review of the movie, not the book.

The verdict: The term "meh" was added to the dictionary this week, and just in time. Hardwicke assumes audiences know everything about everything and thus never establishes the good or bad vampires' agenda (why don't the latter just hunt everyone at school?); if Bella has any personality outside of loving Edward (and why she has no questions for him about how cool it is to run so fast or what prom was like 90 years ago); or why the vampires play baseball—which they can only do during thunderstorms, to drown out the immense crack of the bat—when tennis or soccer would be so much less of a hassle. Pattinson's got star quality, but the movie doesn't move nearly as quickly as Edward, stuck in a holding pattern of set-ups that, so far, neither result in much excitement or promise more to come. All that's left is some cheap-looking effects and the constant, breathless chill of forbidden love between Edward and Bella, which will only arouse viewers who get off on watching people constantly about to kiss.

Did you know? Edward can read minds, and when he scans a room he determines everyone is either thinking about money, sex or cats. Either his detection skills are a little rusty or maybe it wouldn't be so awesome to read people's minds after all.

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