The final and highly anticipated installment for the Twilight saga has finally hit cinemas. With teen girls excited to see Jacob (played by Taylor Lautner) take his shirt off, the rest of us were intrigued to see how Bella (Kristen Stewart) and Edwards (Robert Pattinson) relationship grew after Bella becoming a vampire and having a human/vampire child.
The film starts after Bella has just given birth to Renesmee (MacKenzie Foy) and woken as a vampire. As Bella discovers her powerful new senses and the life as a vampire, she soon discovers all is not too safe with the Cullens. The Cullens cousin, Irena, mistakes Renesmee for an immortal child, which are illegal in the vampire world. This leads to the Cullens and the ware wolves facing the Volturi with friends and relatives from all over the world to prove their innocence.
The film explores Bella and Edwards relationship further and touches on Jacobs and Renesmee’s. It also adds a slight twist in the final act turning point that will leave you on the edge of your seats.
Out of all the Twilight films, Kristen gave the better performance. It was believable that she was now a vampire, however, she still looked the same minus the gold contacts. It seemed her character had been developed further and she was able to have greater flexibility with her performance. Renesmee, played by MacKenzie Foy, performed quite well and she was always cute on screen. Taylor Lautner and Robert Pattinson kept their characters the same and did quite well at that, we even got to see a little bonding in there as well. However, I felt that we didn’t see enough of Charlie (Bellas Dad) in the film and there was no mention of her Mother (Rene) or her school friends who she last saw at her wedding in Part 1.
There were a few things that I questioned during the film. Most of the Cullen family has slightly changed in physical appearance from the first film to the last. Vampires in the Twilight saga are frozen in time and don’t change, but there were different hair styles and colours, which put me off a little. I felt that the second half of the film was taken over by the Volturi and we didn’t get to know the other vampires that were collaborating with the Cullens. There were a few sections in the film they could’ve touched on for a bit longer; When Bellas wakes up to discover she’s a vampire, the relationship between Jacob and Renesmee, and I felt the ending was too quick as well.
The colour grading and special effects were done really well. As the film is from Bellas point of view, the colours were more vibrant, bright and everything on screen was very clear. Now that Bella is a vampire we got to see the world the way she does. Some of the motion was fast, possibly too fast for the audience but the general objective in each scene was well understood. The special effects were also well done.
Overall, I think the film was done quite well. The big ‘twist’ at the end was very convincing and I believed it was actually happening which only intensified the climax. I think it was a great last installment for the Twilight saga and director Bill Condon should be congratulated on a truly ‘epic’ finale. I rate it 6 out of 10.
