Now, just in case the title of this website and the photograph on my profile don't give it away, I'll come right out and admit that I'm not a teenage girl. Apparently, this means that I shouldn't have gone to see 'The Twilight Saga: New Moon'. Throwing caution to the wind, however, I went to see it this afternoon. I enjoyed the first movie in the series, after all, despite the fact that I'm the proud owner of a Y chromosome. I don't belong to 'Team Edward' or 'Team Jacob' (if I'm on any 'team', it's 'Team Alice'... am I too old to admit to finding Ashley Greene quite tasty? Probably. I don't care). I haven't even read the books (although I have read author Stephenie Meyer's non-'Twilight' related science fiction novel, 'The Host', and thoroughly enjoyed that one). Anyway, I can safely say, ridicule me if you must, that I enjoyed 'New Moon'. It was a most entertaining way of passing a couple of hours at the cinema.
It wasn't quite as good as the first one, mind you. I found the change in directorial style from 'Twilight' quite jarring for a while, but I soon got used to it. I was expecting to hate the addition of the werewolves, as I cannot stand the whole 'vampires vs. werewolves' thing that seems to be so popular at the moment, but I actually thought it worked quite well here. It's quite annoying that Bella acts like a dumb teenage girl throughout... until you remember that, well, she is a dumb teenage girl and, therefore, her actions are quite appropriate. On the subject of dumb teenagers, I also wish they hadn't laid on the parallels with 'Romeo And Juliet' quite so thickly. The fact that this is basically a re-telling of Shakespeare's most famous play but with vampires and werewolves instead of Capulets and Montagues (seriously; there's even a balcony scene) would have been almost clever if they hadn't felt the need to hammer us over the head with it at every possible chance.
After dismissing these non-quibbles, the only thing that I really dislike about this movie is the really ropey CGI on the werewolves. Seriously; it's some of the worst digital effects work I've seen in a long time. The hair on the werewolves just doesn't look real, they almost look like cute fuzzy teddy bears in some places, the attempt to put human eyes into a wolf's face simply doesn't work at all and, the worst sin for a CGI character, they don't look like they're actually part of their surroundings. If you don't believe me, watch their feet: at times they actually look like they're floating an inch or so off the ground. Terrible CGI werewolves aside, however, this is another solid installment in the 'Twilight' series. I'm quite looking forward to the next one now.
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