By Gary Newman, Columnist
After much anticipation Part One of Breaking Dawn, the final installment of The Twilight Saga was released. Just like was done with the Harry Potter films, it was decided to break up the final movie into two parts, one because of the duration of the books and two, to get as much money out of the process as possible. Which is exactly what all involved with the movies will do. After two weeks in theaters the movie still sits on top of the box office charts.
Part One took on the job of setting up the final movie, which can be challenging because most movies see the story through the end. Viewers finally got to see the wedding of Bella (Kristen Stewart) and Edward (Robert Pattinson), which between their wedding and honeymoon covered the first half of the movie. Clothing was very optional in the first half as well. Director Bill Condon waited barely a minute to have Jacob (Taylor Lautner) rip off his shirt for the teenage girls and run off in a rage turning into a werewolf after receiving the invitation to Bella and Edward's wedding.
Although this act gets old after the two previous films, you have to do what puts the audiences into the seats. Besides Taylor Lautner's ripped body, Twilight fans get to see Bella and Edward have sex for the first time, ending in Edward breaking the bed. These scenes between Bella and Edward were of much controversy for avid Twilight fans that did not get to see the explicit scenes between Bella and Edward in Stephenie Meyer's novel. Since the target audience for the movie is teenagers, a PG-13 rating was needed to get families to come out and see it, which took away from the original story. Sorry, it looks like good, wholesome sex scenes will have to do.
I thought Kristen Stewart gave her best performance so far in the Twilight Series. Although the character Bella has faced extreme circumstances in past movies, Stewart takes on the new challenges Bella faces with great stride and gives her fans some new and exciting material to watch.
My main issue with the acting came with Taylor Lautner. As a personal fan of the character Jacob, he is getting boring to me. Lautner plays the same actions over and over again. Jacob can be a complex character, but all I am getting out of Lautner is anger and frustration and he rarely ever turns to anything else.
Breaking Dawn is a must see for those who plan to see the final movie. It did it's job of setting up Part Two, but beyond that it was a mediocre film.