It would be easy to dismiss Twilight as unmitigated garbage. There is, after all, so very much to mock: the at times cringe-worthy dialogue, the hollow back story; the laughable bad guys, the silly effects, the dreary pacing, and the lack of anything even remotely scary.

            But, you know what, I am not going to go down that road.

            Let us instead focus on the good stuff. And, folks, there actually is some in Twilight.

            The first half of the film works well. For reasons irrelevant to the story, Bella Swan (the superb Kristen Stewart) is forced to move from her mother’s home in Phoenix to her pop’s place in Forks, Oregon, for the last part of the school year. She has not seen her father, the local sheriff, in several years, making the transition awkward. In vintage Beverly Hills 90210 fashion, Bella is quickly befriended by a colorful assortment of students lifted directly from the B studio casting guide: the kooky newspaper editor, the brainy chick, the madcap prankster, and the full-figured stalwart. Just as rapidly, she becomes aware of the Cullens—a “family” of adopted children headed by the town’s platinum-haired emergency room physician, Dr. Carlisle Cullen. These cliquish Cullens don’t hang with the other students. They are a well-coiffed, tastefully (though a tad too gothily) attired but socially aloof bunch. Oh, did I mention that they are—to a one— deathly pallid?  Turns out, of course, that the Cullens are in fact day-walking nosferati. One of them, Edward (America’s new heartthrob Robert Pattinson), is not only devilishly handsome, but strangely drawn to Bella. Edward is sort of an unholy cross between one of the pretty boys on Gossip Girl, Dolph Lundgren, and Leonid Brezhnev. It is Edward who explains to Bella that the Cullens are the vampire equivalents of  “vegetarians”—meaning they only drink the blood of local fauna. They have weaned themselves off humans—though staying that way remains a struggle.

            That all sounds breathtakingly trite, I know. And it is. But it is so well executed, and Kristen Stewart is so convincing in her role, that you get, um, sucked in. Stewart has the razor-sharp features of a young Jena Malone, and the acting chops of Ellen Page.  She is the heart and soul of the film.

            The dramatic core of the movie is the love story between Bella and Edward. Yes, yes— it is all too familiar, like something out of one of those teen-angst dramas on CW.  With lesser actors, the conceit—a simmering passion between a one hundred year old vampire locked in the body of a stylish young man, and a seventeen year old girl—would fail dismally. Here, however, the players rise to the occasion—imbuing their characters with real depth and feeling. There is a touching genuineness in those moments of unfulfilled intimacy between them. Edward’s refusal to consummate their love for fear of losing control and preying on the woman he loves adds a chaste purity perfectly designed to intoxicate young female viewers. Add to that the mystery of why Edward cannot read Bella’s mind, when he can everyone else’s, and you have a perfect storm of tragic, predestined love.

            This is why the hundreds of schoolgirls crammed into the back of theater continue to ooh and ahh throughout the entire picture, why they giggle excitedly as they exit, and why they mass like doves in the lobby to “dish” afterward.

            Catherine Hardwicke’s deft direction brims with wry wit. Hardwicke gave us 2003's brilliant Thirteen. She shows the same uncanny insight into her young subjects here. And—she infuses some welcome humor as well. A good example of that is the vampiric baseball game. That could have been awful, yet Hardwicke pulls it off.

            The truly eye-popping Pacific Northwest scenery—rain-swept river valleys,  towering evergreens, vine-clogged and moss-coated forest glades, and banks of swirling fog—makes a perfect backdrop for the story.

            However, in addition to the liabilities I itemized up front, there are other problems. For one thing, our good vampires ultimately come off as merely cut-rate Marvel superheroes—each with his or her own special power—speed and mind-reading in Edward’s case, prophecy in another’s, and so forth. The  villains—a trio of comically Anne Rice-ish feral vamps shot in agonizing slow-motion most of the time—are similarly plagued. One is a tracker—that is, a vampire who specializes in hunting humans. The fact that humans are as common as dirt, rendering this skill totally moot, is somehow lost in the mix. Another, the leader, has the ability to wear dinner jackets over his bare chest and apparently not feel self-conscious.

            The special effects, while mostly immaterial, are, well, funny looking. For example, when Edward “climbs” the limbless bole of a gigantic pine tree—carrying Bella piggyback—it is as if he is being hoisted up by an invisible rope.

            At 122 minutes, the film is at least a quarter of an hour too long. The final ghastly moments—at the prom, no less —seem to last hours.

            To be fair, there are a couple of  mildly diverting sidelines. We learn about midway through that vampires don’t require sleep. As a plot device that seems to mean nothing, but it does provide food for science fictional consideration. Can rational living beings actually exist indefinitely without sleep? That is a Beggars in Spain (a Hugo winning novella by Nancy Kress)  question  probably far beyond the intellectual scope of Twilight. These  vampires are not, so far as we can tell, supernatural. While they are cold to the touch, they do not appear to be the undead. They are super-predators created by viral infection. Despite their heightened abilities, and their immortality, they are bound by the laws of the natural world. Without sleep, how is it they haven’t gone mad? That element—more than the vampirism, the telepathy, and the Second Sight—is truly creepy.

            Next, we come to the Native Americans—the Indian tribe living on a reservation outside town. They are connected to the Cullens by some ancient pact. It is pretty clear that in the inevitable sequel we are going to “discover” that the Indians are in fact present day werewolves, or shape-shifters of some variety. If you are thinking that this smacks heavily of Underworld, you are right. But it is at least thought provoking.

            So, what do I recommend?

            If you are a fan of this sub-genre—defined I suppose as Romantic Vampirism— see Twilight in the theater. You’ll love it.

            If you are a standard horror fan, rent it—but don’t expect much.

            If you are neither, it is probably best to pass.

Imprint Entertainment
U.S. Release Date: November 21, 2008
Director: Catherine Hardwicke
Screen writer: Melissa Rosenberg
(from the Stephanie Meyer novel)
Running Time: 122 minutes