Twilight - 2 stars

I went in to see Twilight with no expectations. I haven't read the books, so I know very little about the movie. I knew it was about a girl who goes to high school with a boy who turns out to be a vampire. And they fall in love. That's about all I knew.

The premise is very interesting. Edward (Robert Pattinson) is part of a family of vampires (the Cullens), and like Louis in Interview With the Vampire, he doesn't like killing people. Remember when Louie only killed rats? Well, Edward kills deer and drinks their blood. He wants to drink human blood, but he is a 'good' vampire, so he resists. His family does the same. They are the vegitarians of the vampire world.

For some reason the vampire teens go to high scool. They've been doing this for many years. We don't find out how long the others have been vampires, but Edward has been immortal since 1918. That's a lot of school. He says the younger they start, the longer they can stay in one place. I guess that means they go to high school for a few years, graduate, then go to a new town and start all over.

Now, why would they go to high school? They keep to themselves so its not like they really enjoy hanging out with high school kids. I guess it would make them smart. Consider if you could do high school over and over and over ... you would eventually know everything (on a high school level, anyway). Personally, I would go to college over and over. Have you read a college class schedule lately? There are hundreds of subjects you could take. You would never get bored. Plus, you could just audit the class so you wouldn't have to stress about homework.

Anyway, Bella (Kristen Stewart) just moved to the town of Fork, Washington. Its overcast all the time, which makes it convenient for vampires since, you know, its the actual sunlight that kills them, not the UV radiation that gets thru the clouds. Oh but wait, sunlight doesn't kill them. It doesn't even hurt them. It just makes them all shiny like they rubbed Lindsay Funke's diamond cream all over their bodies.

Bella meets Edward and falls in love with him. He wants to kill her and drink her blood, but he resists. Edward takes her home to meet his family. They also want to kill her and drink her blood but they also resist. The first hour and a half of the movie is about Bella and Edward and him trying not to kill her.

An hour and a half in, we finally get some plot. There are 'bad' vampires who have no problem killing humans and drinking their blood. They meet the Cullens and Bella, and one of the vampires (James) decides he wants to kill Bella. The family protects her and the bad vampires leave, but the Cullens know James will be back. Even though there are plenty of other humans, James specifically wants Bella. I think Edward offended James in some way, and James wants to kill Bella just to hurt Edward, thought I'm not sure about that.

In any event, the movie finally gets exciting when the Cullens think of ways to protect Bella, and James starts chasing after her. We are told what a good tracker James is, and I started thinking about Sarah Conner trying to run and hide from the Terminator. The movie could get really good. Unfortunately, it only lasts about 10 minutes and its over. I really wish they could have shortened the first 2 acts and lengthened the 3rd act. The pursuit stuff could have been much better.

I will say that Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart had great chemistry together, and they both gave great performances. I also liked Billy Burke as Bella's father. He provided the only moments of humor in the movie.

I think fans of the book will love this, but it did nothing for me. I was mildly entertained, but if it weren't for all they hype, I would have forgotten about this movie by now.