If Michael Joseph Jackson was the biggest one-man-movement that has graced the earth since I can't even remember... then the TWILIGHT phenomenon must single-handedly be the BIGGEST movie/book movement of the decade at the moment.
The Twilight Saga has gotten us all bedeviled with vampires and infatuated with the undead. Stephenie Meyer's dynamic 4-part series has become a inescapable obsession, a satisfying scratch to that itch that we hardly even recognized was there. Though the series was slow to fame, its anonymity quickly disappeared as word of this fang-ridden love story snowballed parallel to anticipation of the paired indie film, eventually landing a copy of Twilight in every bitten teenager's (and elder person's) hands. The movie collected a whopping total gross of $191,465,414, and its follow-up, New Moon, is predicted to more than double that.
The Twilight sequel is subsequently the cause behind billions of Google searches on subjects like "New Moon news, New Moon pics, Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner" etc. Contests such as the "Teen Vogue Win A Trip to the New Moon Premiere" are giving the legions of fans more to obsess over, as the site offers fans the chance to enter everyday for chance to win an all-expenses-paid trip to the premiere of the most anticipated movie of the fall. Hey, and I'm definitely signed up. With its star-studded cast, New Moon is sure not to be a disappointment.
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Nicki,
ReplyDeleteThe Twilight phenomenon fascinates me too, although for different reasons. I find the books engrossing and easy to read, and on the surface a kind of unassuming romance story with a twist.
But Twilight goes far beyond the traditional romance. Something about these books have awakened a missing link in women (both girls and full grown women) around the GLOBE. As you mentioned with your comment about the google searches, the cast of Twilight must now face the full blast of media saturation and obsession--and an audience that sometimes has a hard time distinguishing fiction from reality (see: the website TwiMoms)
While I enjoy the Twilight series as pure fiction candy, as a Feminist scholar, I am disturbed by some of the underlying anti-feminist tones within the novel. Of course, this is the whole romance trope coming into play, with the weak, oppressed female always needing to be saved by her knight in shining armor (or in this case, a serious case of knight in shining sparkles!). We see this interaction with the delicate Bella and the brooding Edward. Furthermore, there is something about Edward's fascination/obsession with Bella that veers into stalker territory, with Edward looming over Bella in bed or watching her every moment, which, if he weren’t a cute vampire--we may find kind of creepy. Its certainly something to think about as girls wax poetic about "wanting their own Edward."
Overall though, I appreciate that people are reading and getting excited about reading, and I see the underlying implications of the gender issues Twilight portrays as just another way we can keep dialogue going and open about this fascinating literature phenomemon!