What a [Twilight] weekend!

"Twilight takes a big bite out of the box office"

"Twilight has bite at the box office"

"Moviegoers enter "Twilight" zone at the box office"

"Twilight: early box office is bloody good"

"Twilight sucks in Fangirls for $70.6 Mil Debut"


Am I the only one disappointed with the slew of headlines regarding the success of Twilight at the box office? I would've imagined, with its vampire theme, you would've seen a lot more of the following:

"Twilight slays competition at the box office"
"Twilight drains the life out of its competitors"
"Twilight makes a killing this weekend"
"Twilight sinks teeth into the box office"

There's so much to work with here! Copywriters, I am disappointed. Anyways, so uh, have you heard the news? Despite some sucky reviews, Twilight pulled in over $70 million this weekend, shattering all expectations. It became the #1 opener for a vampire movie of all time, the biggest opener for a female-directed movie, and made more than Transformers did on its opening weekend last year ($70.5 vs. Twilight's $70.6). Considering the movie pulled in types of crowd who don't normally go out to the movies in droves - women (75% of the audience) and the young (55% of the audience were under 25), those are some AMAZING numbers.

As for my review... Well, I definitely don't recommend the movie to you if you haven't read the book. There are some things the movie does better than the book (cutting out unnecessary and repetitive scenes, pacing the action/suspense throughout, UM the casting of Robert Pattinson), but I think to truly understand the intense relationship of the 2 main characters, as well as to appreciate the cheesiness of the dialogue, reading the book first is best. And as with any book-to-movie adaptations, there are certain things that can never live up to what you imagined it would be like (in Twilight's case, 2 words: sparkling skin). So, I give Twilight a B-. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it very much. I'm just being objective here.

And as proud as I am that a female director made the film, being not a fan of her work in general (I kinda hated Thirteen), I hope that the next one is made by someone other than Catherine Hardwicke. Maybe then we can move away from emo teen angst (though, I guess it is fair to say that Twilight is a bit emo teen angst) and more action, Blockbuster, big budget film making. Oh, and duh, MORE R.PATTINSON!! One more thing, check this NYMag slideshow out, probably my favorite thing written on this subject.