The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (12A)

Film

Thrillers

Twilight Eclipse.jpg

Time Out rating:

<strong>Rating: </strong>2/5

User ratings:

<strong>Rating: </strong>3/5
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Time Out says

Fri Jul 2 2010

Having cut his fangs on tween revenger ‘Hard Candy’ and inventive bloodsucker ‘30 Days of Night’, could director David Slade kick off a ‘Harry Potter’-like reinvigoration of the ‘Twilight’ series? Well, sort of: ‘Eclipse’ is a step up from the painfully anaemic ‘New Moon’, and it’s clearly the work of a filmmaker keen to put his own stamp on the series. But Slade is constrained at every turn by the sheer, crushing lifelessness of author Stephenie Meyer’s material.

‘Eclipse’ barely advances the story at all: we’re still stuck in the town of Forks, where moody heroine Bella  (Kristen Stewart) is forced to choose between undead love-of-her-life Edward (Robert Pattinson) and musclebound werewolf Jacob (Taylor Lautner). There are lots of other characters – silly names are dropped with dizzying regularity – but none of them actually seem to do very much.

Slade directs with  flair: his action sequences, though small in scale, have real drive, and a series of surprisingly grim Civil War flashbacks enable him to utilise a different visual palette from the usual drab greens and greys.

But he can’t disguise the massive flaws inherent in the screenplay: the slipshod plotting, whiny, self-serious tone and excruciating abstinence-first subplot. The biggest problem remains the characters: neither Slade nor Stewart are capable of turning manipulative whinger Bella  into anything more than a joyless black hole sucking the life from every scene, while the only performer capable of giving her part any spark, Anna Kendrick, is completely sidelined this time around. Strictly for Twihards.
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Release details

Rated:

12A

UK release:

Fri Jul 9, 2010

Duration:

124 mins

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Comments & ratings

Rated as: 3/5 (39 ratings)
  • this film is fab ! bella does my absolute head in but... team jacob all the way !!!!

    Emma Sun Jul 11 2010
    Rated as: 5/5
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  • think that the film is not great and a total waste of money. its to old style films and not interesting at all

    wayne Sun Jul 11 2010
    Rated as: 1/5
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  • Totally agree with mick.stupid love story where the guys r runnin aftr bella like a pair of puppies!grow sme for godsake.the vamp n wolf shouldve ditchd her if u ask me.the 'plug' 4 the muse single was the last straw.teenyboppers movie.they dnt knw wht real love is!

    ric Sun Jul 11 2010
    Rated as: 1/5
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  • hey i wanna know does eclipse have any sexuality in any scene?

    maxie crofwell Sat Jul 10 2010
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  • And to add that the cliched and still mvoing scenes from the earlier two have been turned into Camp by David Slade. No one catches this either. His effortless switching from Camp to real emotion is awesome. Pattinson does this brilliantly. His makeup in this film is Camp, and he walks the tightrope perfectly. Bella is correctly innocence and truth and beauty (thank you Keats) and Jake (Jacob) changes after his Vision Quest. Does the book mention Vision quest or not? I haven't read it. Another perfect film is the Swedish Girl With a the Dragon Tattoo. Much much finer than the Millinnium Trilogy it comes from.

    abbeysbooks Fri Jul 9 2010
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  • For girls SHOULD put out-Your comment was insightful. This is a brilliant film, not in terms of film theory and critique, but in terms of Foucault's lifetime work that is changing history and the rest of the social sciences. In brief this film is about DESIRE and the sexual longing that accompanies it. The film is a History of Sexuality in the Western world. It's all there. Yes Meyer is not the best writer, but her theme is deep. This is why it resonates and that is something the critics cannot come to terms with because they cannot understand it. I shall be writing about it on my blog foucaultseye at some point soon. The critics are all wrong to view it in terms of the Discourse of film. The Twilight Saga is an event, not a single film. It is a statement in the history of sexuality. The critics come from the era of Recreational Sex. Desire is irrelevant. It leads to deSade and Limit Experiences in sex (pornography, SM etc). The critics reviewing this film so far do not recognize Desire (Lacan, philosophy, Deleuze, Guartarr) as they themselves are not steeped in modern philosophy which concerns itself with Desire. I thought you might like to know all this and that you are not flying in the face of convention. You might like to start with Foucault's History of Sexuality vol I, II, III. I doubt Stepheie Meyer's is ery much aware of this break in history, but her unconscious is, and that is what a writer writes from. It is why Lou Andreas-Salome told Rilke not to undergo psychoanalysis to cure his demons.

    abbeysbooks Fri Jul 9 2010
    Rated as: 5/5
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  • Great Movie!; Cant wait to Watch it :P

    Sally Fri Jul 9 2010
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  • Weird "safe" bad boy drama obviously aimed at pre-teens. The director could do nothing with this derivative sucky tale of a boring everyteen more lifeless than her undead boyfriend. Why does Lisa Simpson's "Non Threatening Boys" come to mind? I wonder...

    Mick Fri Jul 9 2010
    Rated as: 1/5
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  • warewolfes,undead,zombies ,lets face it this black and white film made in 1954 surely does not deserve to be rereleased. the special effects were a joke you could clearly see strings on the puppets. also having a semi naked jimmy krankie in every scene ,did not advance the plot. cmon give us twihards u rated fun

    kevin the great Fri Jul 9 2010
    Rated as: 5/5
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  • Love this movie, I think it's better than New Moon. Read the book as well. It's amazing! :)

    Dora Thu Jul 8 2010
    Rated as: 5/5
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