eclipse movie review

Ok, so I’ve seen Eclipse twice now and I’ve moved from “feeling kind of meh/iffy about it” to “liked it overall.” Here is a list of things that stood out to me (originally posted this in the Twilight group on Ravelry, but I’ve kind of elaborated on them here).

(This post contains dozens of spoilers, obviously!)

Things I liked:

• The first scene with Bella and Edward. Soooo sweet! And all of their scenes together. This is the first of the three movies where I really believed them as a couple. In the other movies, they always seemed withdrawn from each other. Example: the kisses in New Moon were just blah. BLAH. Especially the reunion kiss in Italy–that one was severely lacking. But the affection in Eclipse is believable. Finally!
• Compromise, aka Leg Hitch/the proposal. I approve. In fact, I was like…just do it already, haha! It was over so quickly, though. I did like the little part where he picked her up and spun her around while they hugged. awww. It was so important that this scene be done properly, because if it hadn’t been included or had been toned down, I think Team Edward everywhere would have imploded and rioted the theaters, I don’t know. But I was happy with the scene.
• Bella & Charlie–“the talk” was hilarious. I love movie Charlie better than book Charlie, I think. Each movie just reinforces this opinion.
• Bryce Dallas Howard as Victoria 2.0–I really hate when parts get recast, but I think she did a good job. The look on her face right before she rushed Edward at the end kind of made me laugh, though. (The whole shaking/baring teeth thing…I don’t know, it was scary at first but then it looked kind of funny to me?) I do like BDH in pretty much every movie I’ve seen her in, though, so it helped that she was the new Victoria.
• The flashbacks and backstories for Rosalie and Jasper…I thought they were well done. Rosalie’s fiance oozed serious creepster, and the scene with him and his friends right before they attack Rosalie made me SO uncomfortable. I’m glad nothing was shown beyond that because I was really bothered by the implications. I know that’s from the book, but just seeing it that way really made me more sympathetic toward Rosalie. As for Jasper, I liked his flashback, but his accent kept waxing and waning and that was distracting for me. Otherwise, I liked his flashback.
• Taylor’s performance as Jacob always makes me like him better than I did from the books. I think movie Jacob is better written than book Jacob, in the sense that he’s more likable in the movies. I remember that I didn’t like Jacob until we got his POV in Breaking Dawn.
• Song placements. When I first listened to the soundtrack, I wasn’t crazy about most of the songs, but when I saw the movie, they seemed to fit nicely. I’ll probably like the soundtrack more now that I can visualize the scenes that go with them.
• The special effects looked really good, especially for the fight scene. I also thought Jacob wolf looked very realistic when he came up to Bella and she petted his head.

Things I didn’t like so much (in which I get very rambly and run-on sentence and probably incoherent):

• The wigs. Very distracting, although I noticed that Kristen’s wig looked better at times and really obvious at other times. Nikki/Rosalie’s wig wouldn’t have been so bad if they had lightened her eyebrows to match. Jasper’s wig was kind of fail, too. I thought I was going to really hate Bryce/Victoria’s wig, but I didn’t mind it so much.
• The Cullen contact lenses looked really weird in this one–almost orange at times. I wish they would’ve toned them down a bit. I was glad that they had black/hungry eyes during one scene since that was appropriate (and missing from New Moon–Edward should have had black eyes in Italy, but didn’t, and ok this is just nitpicking but this is what the fandom does).
• The epicness of the Jacob/Bella kiss. Look, I’m Team Edward, what do you expect me to say? lol That being said…I thought Kristen put more oomph into her kiss with Taylor, plus the kiss seemed to go on forever, so I was like…hmm. Interesting. I wish she would put that much effort into her kisses with Rob, so that they would be more believable. But we did get the aforementioned Leg Hitch, so I can’t complain too much!
• I guess my biggest complaint with this one, as well as the other movies, is that I feel like it’s never really and truly clear why Bella is so in love with Edward. In the books, since we’re constantly in her head and seeing from her POV, it’s obvious…but in the movies, not so much. I think that probably has to do with the script as well as Kristen’s acting–the latter of which is getting better, but I don’t know. I almost feel like, if I had never read the books and only saw the movies, that I’d be leaning more toward Team Jacob…maybe I need to re-read the books or something, because my impression of Jacob from reading Eclipse was that he’s a nice kid, but just as manipulative of Bella as Edward is–it’s just that Bella chooses Edward in the end, which makes Jacob ultimately resentful of both of them going into Breaking Dawn. But in the movie, Jacob’s flaws are really toned down, which I think explains why so many people are all, Team Jacob/Team Taylor after seeing the movies. (There is also Team Jacob Because of His Awesome Abs and Not Really Any Other Reason, which is just…never mind.) Also, as much as I like movie Jacob, I just can’t get past his pursuit of Bella being a means to an end, in context of Breaking Dawn. Because SPOILER ALERT, when Jacob is kissing Bella, I just want to yell at the screen, ‘ew that is your future mother-in-law you are kissing’ and I can’t see Eclipse in a vacuum, I just keep thinking ‘RENESMEE! this is your future!’ and ‘imprinting on a baby’ and this is why I am firmly planted on the team I’m on. And then I remind myself that this is just Twilight and I need to stop ranting about this now, so…I think I will. lol

Yep, so those are my thoughts, incoherent as they may be. I definitely liked the film much more the second time I saw it. The first time, I was trying to process the differences between this and the previous two films, but the second time, I knew what to expect, so I was able to enjoy it more as a viewing experience. Also, I was pretty impressed with David Slade as the director–I had my doubts because I was worried he would play up the action too much and downplay the romance, but he didn’t do that at all. Overall, I’d say the movies keep getting better…but then I think about what the next movie is going to be, and oh dear, it’s all downhill from here, isn’t it?