Review: 'The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1'

Nov. 18, 2011— -- There is one believable moment in The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1. It is a moment that reminds us that Kristen Stewart is so much more than the one-dimensional, less-than-interesting, lightning rod for monster love that is her character, Bella Swan (think Natalie Portman in the Star Wars movies).

That believable moment is during the wedding scene, when Bella begins her walk down the aisle. Anyone can get cold feet, but this young woman is about to commit to a permanent case of cold feet by marrying Edward, her vampire lover, then becoming just like him ... undead! Director Bill Condon's camera catches terror in her eyes; 100 pages of subtext in an instant. It is the most truthful moment of "The Twilight Saga" series thus far.

Then, there's the rest of the movie.

Wow.

Awful. And practically unwatchable. The good news, such as it is, is that some scenes are so bad, they're funny.

"The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1" is in trouble from the start. We see Bella's mother receive an invitation to her daughter's wedding. She seems surprised. Why? Did we miss something? Is it explained in the book why she doesn't seem to know she'll be getting an invitation to her daughter's wedding? If so, why isn't it explained in the movie?

At the wedding itself, Edward springs Jacob on Bella as a wedding present. Huh? Oh, I get it -- it's the mythology of Edward, the quiet, sensitive, understanding monster who's confident enough to allow his new wife to hang out with a guy who desperately loves her, and to whom she in turn is attracted. This scene alone drives a stake through the heart of the movie.

Bella continues to give Jacob mixed signals. Jacob continues to be more interesting than Edward. Edward continues to sulk. My eyelids continue to grow heavy.

The apparent intention of "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1" is to sweep us up in the romance of Bella and Edward's honeymoon. Not happening. If you've already been sucked into this love story via the book, then perhaps you'll be interested in whether or not Edward can make love to his new wife without killing her. If you've just come to know these two through the movie, you're hoping the projectionist throws the switch and shows Texas Governor Rick Perry's most recent campaign meltdown instead. At least that was entertaining.

Giving credit where it's due, Bella's pregnancy is brilliant on paper. On celluloid, it's a joke. Again, Stewart out-acts the laughable dialogue but that makes it no less unbelievable.

There's no pleasure to be had in pointing out how simply bad "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1" is. It's actually quite disheartening. It's tough when bad movies happen to good people, and there are a lot of good people involved in this franchise. When it comes to Part 2, here's hoping they TWI harder.

One out of five stars.