Twilight: Eclipse
(Starring Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner)
Though many adults love it, at its core, the Twilight series is supernatural love story for hormonal teenagers. The first two films had lugubrious pacing and turgid emo romance instead of plot. This third installment is more humorous, and—forgive this joke about a vampire film—more lively. It’s still shallow, but at least it doesn’t completely suck… (Sorry.)
In the last flick, Stewart made a bargain with vampire Pattinson, she would marry him if he turned her into a one of his wildlife-eating, pace-and-love vampires. (They’re too moral to feed on humans). Lautner, a local Native American hottie, showed Stewart she had other options. His tribespeople are werewolves sworn to protect humankind from the walking dead. In this installment, a vengeful gang of bloodsuckers plan to kill Stewart. So, the supernatural enemies team up to protect Stewart while she decides between loving a dog-man or a vampire.
As silly as this movie is, it’s nice to finally have a plot! Bolstering this drippy, teenaged romance is actual action and bits of comedy. Pubescent and mostly shirtless Lautner doesn’t quite yet have the chops for the dramatic moments. However, Pattinson and Stewart sometimes act almost as much as they strike poses.
Still, these lusty youngsters spend a bit of celluloid talking about true love as if their lives—and afterlives—completely depended on it. Vampires and werewolves, I can believe in; a deep and successful teenage marriage is a little harder to swallow.
The Last Airbender
(Starring Noah Ringer, Nicola Peltz, Jackson Rathbone, Dev Patel, Cliff Curtis)
The Last Airbender is the live-action version of Nickelodeon TV’s anime series. It should’ve stayed a cartoon. This Zen-based story suffers from strange discontinuities, clunky dialogue and uneven 3-D effects. Worst of all—almost entirely across the board—the acting is about as graceful as an injured walrus doing karate.
In a future Earth wracked by war, Peltz is a girl who can manipulate water. One day, she finds Ringer, the last of a people who can control air. She knows this is a holy child who will bring balance back to the planet. She and her brother Rathbone take the young Ringer on a spiritual journey to learn new skills and conquer the violent, fire-wielding tribe.
Sadly, Airbender’s Eastern philosophy is mostly foreign to American audiences, and the script does nothing to make it feel less alien. Writer/director M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, The Happening) really should hire a better writer to work with him. His lack of talent leaves most of the actors here floundering. The film could’ve at least been visually stunning, but the 3-D effects were an afterthought, and they look it. The colorful animated series makes the movie version look downright drab.
Besides some intermittently interesting fight choreography, there is only one positive. Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire) ably portrays an angry fire prince disowned by his dad the king (Curtis). His performance shows us what Airbender could be with better writing and stronger acting.
Knight and Day
(Starring Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Paul Dano)
You can quibble about the silliness of this over-the-top action adventure. You can bemoan the ridiculous use of star power to sell a film with obvious plot holes. However, most movie-goers seeking out fun will be very forgiving.
Diaz is a single mechanic who bumps into super-spy Cruise before a plane flight out of Wichita. It turns out Cruise is in charge of saving a brilliant young science nerd (Dano) and his invention—a self-charging battery that could power a small city. Crazy Cruise swears someone in his CIA agency is double-dealing. However, it appears that Cruise may be the criminal when Diaz comes back from the plane’s bathroom to find he’s killed everyone else on the aircraft.
Can she trust him? Have you ever seen a film? Of course, you have! This stuff has the Hitchcockian possibility of a Cary Grant charmer. Instead, it shoots lower—Romancing the Stone fed through Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
How do they handle the myriad plot holes? Do it in the filmiest, flimsiest way possible, of course! They have Cruise drug or knock out Diaz every so often, so she can mysteriously wake up in Jamaica or in Eastern Europe. It’s creepy kidnapping presented as a stupid way to bloat the film’s budget and show audiences several exotic corners of the world.
It’s all in the name of fun, so you can forget how stupid this all is.
