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“BREAKING DAWN” BLOODY AWFUL

TWILIGHT: BREAKING DAWN

Starring Robert Pattinson,

Kristen Stewart,

Taylor Lautner,

Billy Burke,

Gil Birmingham,

Sarah Clarke,

Ashley Greene,

Peter Facinelli

Directed by Bill Condon

Written by Melissa Rosenberg

Based on the novel by Stephenie Meyer

Running time 117 mins.

Rated PG-13

         
I did not want to have to see it. The only thing worse than shiny little vampires is a shiny little vampire wedding.

          The problem is that the “Twilight” movie franchise is to both film and horror what a clothing catalog is to literature. Everything “Twilight” I’ve ever seen looks to me like it gets dropped out of a nozzle over a conveyor belt. This time, apparently the company added more wood product filler, and bumped up the dye on the sprinkles.

          Upshot: Shiny little vampire wedding.

          Camera on gown. Hold on gown for four minutes. Camera on ring. Hold on ring for five minutes. Better make it six—company says it wants a two-parter to maximize profits. Ker-splort.

          Would that the company had any idea how spectacularly bad pancake makeup looks smeared on people’s faces. I find it extremely distracting to see that the makeup people didn’t bother to push that junk up into the hairline. Or down into the neckline. Evidently, somebody somewhere said, “Oh, don’t worry about it. No one will be the wiser.”

          Pick a detail, any detail. Everything with “Twilight” is substandard. Who decided that a way to indicate vampire-ness is obvious, uncomfortable-looking colored contact lenses? When Taylor Lautner turns into a werewolf, running across the lawn in his Capris, magically his little pants completely disappear—and that’s not how werewolves work!

          Breaking “Breaking Dawn” down, it’s basically glorified daytime TV. By “glorified” I mean “corporate-pushed.” In a twisted, totally unintended way, Twinkie vampires and werewolves is kind of monstrous. Even that, however, pales in comparison to the narrow, one-dimensionality of the characters.

          Not that it’s the actors’ fault. Robert Pattinson’s performance in “Water for Elephants” released early this year still impresses me, as does Taylor Lautner’s in “Abduction.”

          But “Breaking Dawn” has a place in cinema, and I think that’s right next to “Reefer Madness.” For crying out loud, even Anne Rice can’t stand this stuff. And I couldn’t agree more. Anything that can make “Interview with the Vampire”--and “Dark Shadows,” for that matter--seem comparatively authentic takes a special kind of bad.