Final Twilight installment falls flat

What do you do when you don’t have enough material for a full-length feature film? Go crazy with the montages. Obviously.

In the fifth and final installment of the illustrious Twilight Saga, our heroine Bella Cullen née Swan resumes life post demon-baby birth.

Life, of course, being a debatable word here; her near brush with death has resulted in her transformation into a newborn vampire. As such, she can pounce on mountain lions, sparkle in the sunlight and, finally, become a bona fide member of the Cullen clan.

Aside from a few blips surrounding her half-human, half-vampire daughter Renesmee (Jacob Black imprinting on her, Bella’s father coming to the realization that his daughter is a teenage mother — the usual), it seems as though this new existence is going to be a happy and relatively easy one for Bella.

That is, until a jealous ex-girlfriend of her husband’s catches sight of Renesmee, believes her to be an illegal immortal child, tattles to the sadistic godfathers of the vampire world, aka the Volturi, and deliberately sets in motion the face-off of the last few centuries. What’s left of the film is subsequently dedicated to a gathering of forces for a final climactic battle between old and young, tradition and love, Italy and the rest of the world – a battle promising the triumph of what is good and right over perpetuating evil. A battle… that never actually happens. Also, a whole lot of montages.

Media darling Kristen Stewart reprises her role as Bella – and demonstrates, admittedly, a much wider range of facial expressions than is often attributed to her. Robert Pattinson also returns as his pasty-skinned, badly-hairstyled doppelganger Edward. The two exchange a constant stream of cheesy, cliché, and just plain over-the-top declarations of love throughout.

They also serve as the main go-to figures for several extreme close-up sequences that do more to highlight the fact that Breaking Dawn really should not have been broken into two movies than to convey some sort of deep, all-abiding passion. These ‘moments’ are so unnecessarily drawn out, it’s clear that they serve as filler for a plot that has little else to offer – much like the three rounds of credits-plus-aforementioned-montages that are just as prominently featured.

Despite all the criticism that can and has been thrown at Breaking Dawn, however, it cannot be said that the film is entirely without redemption. Quite the contrary – it has its fair share of surprisingly solid elements. The supporting cast, in particular, is consistently excellent. Standouts performances include those by Ashley Greene, returning as pixie-like Alice Cullen, Martin Sheen as the delightfully creepy Aro, and Kellan Lutz reprises his role as the charmingly boyish Emmett. Little Renesmee is also adorable and impressively engaging – after all, of course, the obviously-CGI version of Renesmee ‘ages’ her enough for twelve-year-old actress Mackenzie Foy to, well… act.

There were quite a few humorous spots as well, the most notable among them involving the much-loved Taylor Lautner stripping down in front of a wary and comically bewildered Billy Burke (as Bella’s father, Charlie Swan).

But, regardless, the unavoidable overall impression of Breaking Dawn is one of painstaking extension. Over an hour of insignificant and often awkward minutiae serve as a lead-in for one single crucial scene – the explosive, chaotic mass-slaughter of Alice’s undetermined vision that lasts for all of fifteen minutes and was clearly written for the movie to lend it something more than what basically amounts to an incomplete plot arc. Essentially, a shining example of good screenwriter decision-making.

Fan or foe, anyone who cares at all about things like witnessing the long-awaited end of Stephanie Meyer’s infamous vampire series – and who hasn’t already done so – should go and see BDP2. There’s hormone-driven angst enough if you’re of the former variety, and plenty of incredulous amusement in store for those among the latter. Those not particularly bothered either way, however, should definitely leave their wallet right where it is. Rest assured: you’re really not missing out on much.