I’m generally not one to get caught up in the latest ‘flavors’ no matter the source. I like to look into things on my own and decide whether or not I’m ‘into it’. I’ve just never found myself to be a part of the mob mentality. “Twilight” was first introduced to me last year when dropping my stepson off at a bookstore. He was meeting some friends who were waiting for a book signing for author Stephenie Meyer. It seems she was in town to sign copies of her book, “Twilight – Breaking Dawn.” I had never heard of it, but my stepson told me it was part of a series of ‘awesome’ vampire books. This piqued my interest, in part because I’m into all things horror… but more because me stepson is NOT into reading. Anything that caught his attention might be worth checking out.

The first thing I did was visit the various websites associated with the “Twilight” series and found out all about the main plot, which involved loner girl Bella and her relationship with Edward… a vampire. The first book introduced us to Bella as she moved from sunny Arizona to drab and dark Forks, Washington to live with her father. As if going to a new school wasn’t bad enough, she soon found herself obsessed with fellow student Edward Cullen. Edward was somewhat pale, but by her descriptions had the face and body of a God. (Glad to see she wasn’t at all shallow.) Edward was part of a family of teenagers adopted by a local doctor and his wife, the adoption part made all the more weird by the fact that all of the members of the family shared this pasty appearance.

That was good enough for me, so I tracked down the audiobooks for all four books, and my wife and I settled in over the next few weeks listing to them in the car to and from work. (We’re currently almost to the end of book four.) We were very quickly caught up in Bella and Edward’s world, despite some of the teenage angst trappings. Actually, my wife got really sucked in by the angst but we both agreed that though we loved Bella… she was an idiot. It took her far too long to figure out what Edward was… a fact that is exacerbated in the second book when it takes her even longer to ‘figure out’ the secret of another major character. But Bella’s denseness aside, we both loved what we both loved the story.

The movie for the first book came out, and I opted to pass it up in theatres (at first) because I was sure it would be disappointing. But even at this point I did not realize what a phenomenon it was until one day while I was in a Supervisor’s meeting at my work. It seemed that out of our 8 person team, no less than 5 of us were into the books (and audiobooks). After that, every meeting started out with at least 10 minutes of discussing the latest chapters, careful not to give anything away to those who were not as far. Once the discussion of the movie came up, I was told that it was a fairly faithful adaptation, albeit a bit truncated as are most adaptations from book to screen.

Armed with that information, my wife and I took my stepson and his girlfriend to the theatre to see it for ourselves. Afterwards I agreed that it was a really good adaptation and had kept most of the spirit of the book, but it needed to be longer. It did take a little bit to accept Kristen Stewart as Bell and Robert Pattinson as Edward, but only because we had preconceived notions of what they should look like. Once we got past the initial scenes, they settled into our imaginations just fine as they did wonderful jobs with their interpretations of the characters. I also had a few problems with some of the effects, most notably when we are shown what really happens to vampires when they walk out in the sun. In the book, this is a major change from the accepted vampire lore, but its description is easy to swallow. Seeing it on the big screen… well… let’s just say all that glitters is not gold.

That said, “Twilight” is not your typical vampire movie. In many ways there is little originality to it, but it does take a lot of liberties with the vampire lore. There are many changes from what most of us know including how to kill them. And the word used to describe the Cullen family in terms of their diet, in order to make them ‘good’ vampires is kind of a hoot. It definitely appeals to a younger audience, as does the relationship as whole. I do worry about the whole obsession part of Bella’s side of the equation as it plays in the movie. In the book, you do get deeper into the feelings that surround her obsession and they begin to make sense. The movie is not allowed to delve as deeply, making her obsession seem like little more than an Emo girl crushing on a really gorgeous guy. Still, that is not enough to completely knock the movie. But the way it plays out, it works better as a companion piece to the book as opposed to a stand-alone movie.

As we now turn to the release of the DVD and Blu-ray, I have to tell you as much as I enjoy the books and now the movie, I still can’t quite get over the hoopla surrounding the series. The release was set to be on a Saturday, starting at Midnight on Friday, as opposed to the normal Tuesday release date that most DVDs have. Then there was a lot of buzz generated about the Friday night sales to get people to line up for their copy. I was just thankful that we received a Blu-ray for review. I know my wife would have begged me to get in line and wait. Instead, we watched it the day before it came out (much better… and warmer…).

The Blu-ray release of “Twilight” is terrific. The picture, as you would expect, is crystal clear. The town of Forks looks as drab as it should. The sound was spectacular, mixing the rock soundtrack with the dialogue without any noticeable loss of either. It also offers up several special features, which we didn’t waste any time getting to after the movie. First we jumped into the ‘making of’ documentary, which runs a little under an hour. There was choice of watching it by itself, or as a picture-in-picture with the movie. We opted for the former, figuring it would be too distracting watching them together. As far as ‘making of’ docs go, this one was about average. There were some nice behind scenes footage, but the interviews were a little too saccharine for me. There were also some deleted and extended scenes, most of which offered a little more insight into what drives the main characters, but I can still see why they were cut. You’ll also find a short presentation video of the cast and crew at 2008’s Comic-Con, as well as music videos for Linkin Park's "Leave Out All the Rest," Muse's "Super Massive Black Hole" and Paramore's "Decode."

When we were ready to run through the movie again, we set up the audio commentary by director Catherine Hardwicke and stars Stewart and Pattinson. For the most part, Hardwicke chimed in with some interesting background materials, but Stewart and Pattinson were all over the place, mostly joking around. It was fine and funny for a while, but it did get a little old. I really would have liked to have heard from author Meyer. They should have definitely gotten her in to do some commentary.

“Twilight” is probably not going to appeal to hardcore horror fans, as it is much more a romantic story aimed at teenagers. However, I really did enjoy it overall (having read the books) and am very much looking forward to the upcoming sequel later on this year. The story goes in directions and introduces characters that I found more interesting than Bella and Edward and I am curious to see how well they pull it off.

Directed by: Catherine Hardwicke
Starring: Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Billy Burke, Peter Facinelli
Extras: Audio Commentary, Featurettes, Music Videos, Theatrical Trailers, Exclusive HD Content - Picture-in-Picture, BD-Live
Specifications: 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 (2.35:1), English DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround (48kHz/24-bit) , French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround (640kbps)
Studio: Summit
Release Date: 3/21/2009
Region 1
MPAA Rating: PG-13
http://www.twilightthemovie.com

We'll give Twilight a B+.