Now Playing
Critics & Publications
Archives: A-Z Index
Advanced Search
Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
58
Adam Resurrected
64
Appaloosa
69
Ashes of Time Redux
68
August Evening
54
Battle in Seattle
75
Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
70
Black Balloon, The
xx
Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh
55
Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
51
Breakfast with Scot
xx
Cargo 200
44
Chandni Chowk to China
63
Changeling
64
Che
56
Cherry Blossoms
84
Christmas Tale, A
94
Class, The
38
Dark Streets
58
Defiance
43
Donkey Punch
xx
Dostana
62
Duchess, The
46
Dukes, The
63
Eden
xx
Extreme Movie
69
Fear(s) of the Dark
26
Filth and Wisdom
28
Fireproof
80
Frost/Nixon
43
Gardens of the Night
73
Girl Cut in Two, A
40
Good
54
Good Dick
30
Guitar, The
84
Happy-Go-Lucky
31
Hounddog
21
House of the Sleeping Beauties
50
How About You
70
Hunger
72
I Served the King of England
70
I.O.U.S. A
40
Igor
79
I've Loved You So Long
64
JCVD
65
Just Another Love Story
29
Lake City
57
Last Chance Harvey
82
Let the Right One In
31
Let Them Chirp Awhile
xx
Local Color
17
Lodger, The
xx
Luck by Chance
89
Man on Wire
xx
Medicine for Melancholy
70
Moscow, Belgium
36
My Name Is Bruce
28
Nobel Son
43
Not Easily Broken
64
Nothing But the Truth
79
Of Time and the City
40
Other End of the Line, The
34
Otto; or Up with Dead People
75
Pool, The
78
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
xx
Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi
82
Rachel Getting Married
58
Reader, The
56
Religulous
32
Repo! The Genetic Opera
53
RocknRolla
65
Scott Walker: 30 Century Man
82
Secret of the Grain, The
xx
Shadows
75
Silent Light
86
Slumdog Millionaire
57
Special
82
Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
67
Synecdoche, New York
82
Tell No One
68
Theater of War
68
Timecrimes
83
Trouble the Water
43
Tru Loved
83
U2 3D
90
Waltz with Bashir
59
We Are Wizards
81
Wendy and Lucy
71
What Doesn't Kill You
55
What Just Happened?
61
Where God Left His Shoes
40
While She Was Out
81
Wrestler, The
48
Yonkers Joe
94
Class, The
90
Waltz with Bashir
89
Man on Wire
86
Slumdog Millionaire
84
Christmas Tale, A
84
Happy-Go-Lucky
83
Trouble the Water
83
U2 3D
82
Tell No One
82
Secret of the Grain, The
82
Rachel Getting Married
82
Let the Right One In
82
Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
81
Wrestler, The
81
Wendy and Lucy
80
Frost/Nixon
79
Of Time and the City
79
I've Loved You So Long
78
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
75
Pool, The
75
Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
75
Silent Light
73
Girl Cut in Two, A
72
I Served the King of England
71
What Doesn't Kill You
70
Black Balloon, The
70
Moscow, Belgium
70
Hunger
70
I.O.U.S. A
69
Ashes of Time Redux
69
Fear(s) of the Dark
68
August Evening
68
Timecrimes
68
Theater of War
67
Synecdoche, New York
65
Just Another Love Story
65
Scott Walker: 30 Century Man
64
Che
64
JCVD
64
Nothing But the Truth
64
Appaloosa
63
Changeling
63
Eden
62
Duchess, The
61
Where God Left His Shoes
59
We Are Wizards
58
Adam Resurrected
58
Reader, The
58
Defiance
57
Special
57
Last Chance Harvey
56
Cherry Blossoms
56
Religulous
55
Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
55
What Just Happened?
54
Battle in Seattle
54
Good Dick
53
RocknRolla
51
Breakfast with Scot
50
How About You
48
Yonkers Joe
46
Dukes, The
44
Chandni Chowk to China
43
Tru Loved
43
Donkey Punch
43
Gardens of the Night
43
Not Easily Broken
40
While She Was Out
40
Igor
40
Other End of the Line, The
40
Good
38
Dark Streets
36
My Name Is Bruce
34
Otto; or Up with Dead People
32
Repo! The Genetic Opera
31
Hounddog
31
Let Them Chirp Awhile
30
Guitar, The
29
Lake City
28
Nobel Son
28
Fireproof
26
Filth and Wisdom
21
House of the Sleeping Beauties
17
Lodger, The
xx
Dostana
xx
Medicine for Melancholy
xx
Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh
xx
Cargo 200
xx
Local Color
xx
Shadows
xx
Luck by Chance
xx
Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi
xx
Extreme Movie
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Twilight
Summit Entertainment
|
|
MPAA RATING: PG-13 for some violence and a scene of sensuality
Starring
Kristen Stewart,
Robert Pattinson,
Billy Burke,
Peter Facinelli,
Elizabeth Reaser,
Cam Cigandet,
Nikki Reed,
and
Jackson Rathbone
Bella Swan has always been a little bit different, never caring about fitting in with the trendy girls at her Phoenix high school. When her mother re-marries and sends Bella to live with her father in the rainy little town of Forks, Washington, she doesn't expect much of anything to change. Then she meets the mysterious and dazzlingly beautiful Edward Cullen, a boy unlike any she's ever met. Edward is a vampire, but he doesn't have fangs and his family is unique in that they choose not to drink human blood. Intelligent and witty, Edward sees straight into Bella's soul. Soon, they are swept up in a passionate, thrilling and unorthodox romance. To Edward, Bella is what he has waited 90 years for - a soul mate. But the closer they get, the more Edward must struggle to resist the primal pull of her scent, which could send him into an uncontrollable frenzy. But what will Edward & Bella do when a clan of new vampires comes to town and threaten to disrupt their way of life? (Summit Entertainment)
GENRE(S): |
Action
|
Horror
|
Romance
|
Suspense/Thriller
|
WRITTEN BY: |
Melissa Rosenberg
Stephenie Meyer (novel)
|
DIRECTED BY: |
Catherine Hardwicke
|
RELEASE DATE: |
Theatrical: November 21, 2008
|
RUNNING TIME: |
120 minutes, Color |
ORIGIN: |
USA |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
80
Empire
Will Lawrence
A sometimes girlie swirl of obsession that will delight fans, this faithful adaptation is after teenage blood, and will most likely hit a box office artery.
80
The New Yorker
David Denby
A genuine love story might be difficult for a young audience to handle, but this fantasy is blissful madness--an abstinence fable sexier than sex.
75
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
Pattison grows on us as he grows on Bella: His weird mannerisms and nervous delivery stop seeming like quirks and acquire an intensity that's hard to resist by the end.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Peter Hartlaub
Twilight has a few gory plot turns - mostly offscreen - and one near-sex scene that may offend a few Amish people, but the rest is maybe 33 percent less wholesome than "High School Musical." It's almost certainly less risque than what you were watching when you were 14. (Cue the soundtrack to "Risky Business.")
75
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
Actually, the movie's a better movie than the book was a book, in part because Meyer struggled to put her characters' galloping emotions into print whereas director Catherine Hardwicke just visualizes them in all their inarticulate purpleness.
75
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
On screen, Twilight is repetitive and a tad sodden, too prosaic to really soar. But Hardwicke stirs this teen pulp to a pleasing simmer.
75
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
Twilight - directed with savvy humor by Catherine Hardwicke - turns vampirism into a metaphor for teen lust.
75
TV Guide
Tracie Cooper
In terms of bringing the book to life, Twilight is a complete success, so much so that most of the film's flaws work within the context of the story.
70
Washington Post
Michael O'Sullivan
On the whole, Twilight works as both love story and vampire story, thanks mainly to the performances of its principals, Pattinson and Stewart.
70
Time
Richard Corliss
So Twilight isn't a masterpiece -- no matter. It rekindles the warmth of great Hollywood romances, where foreplay was the climax and a kiss was never just a kiss.
70
Salon.com
Stephanie Zacharek
Hardwicke still manages to find the sweet spot where Gothic literature and the iPod meet and make goo-goo eyes at each other. Without embarrassment, she and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg dig right into the almost generic simplicity of the story.
70
Los Angeles Times
Kenneth Turan
Hardwicke has connected so intensely to the Meyer novel that it's hard to imagine anyone else making a better version.
70
New York Magazine
David Edelstein
The best thing in the movie is Stewart. She was the leggy hobo-camp teen in love with Emile Hirsch in "Into the Wild," and she's better at conveying physical longing than any of the actors playing vampires.
63
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Bummer. The vampires have no fangs. The humans are humdrum. The special effects and makeup define cheeseball. And the movie crowds in so many characters from Stephenie Meyer’s book that Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen) is less a director than a traffic cop. But there’s a reason that Twilight has already become the movie equivalent of a bestseller: The love story has teeth.
63
Miami Herald
Sara Frederick
None of the movie's flaws will matter. Teenage girls are going to love Twilight,and many are sure to see it more than once.
63
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
Twilight isn't an especially good movie, but neither is it an abomination. At times, the dialogue is laugh-aloud bad - almost to the point of being hilarious.
63
Chicago Tribune
Michael Phillips
The superfast running effects, with Edward dashing up mountains, or rival, evil vampires swooping here and there at amazing speed, look genuinely cheesy, like the guy running the race in the smart-phone ad. I'm surprised Hardwicke and her colleagues couldn't solve this one more effectively. Set pieces such as a vampire baseball game fall flat as well.
63
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
Twilight will mesmerize its target audience, 16-year-old girls and their grandmothers. Their mothers know all too much about boys like this.
60
Slate
Dana Stevens
As a life lesson for teenage girls, Twilight (excuse the pun) sucks. As a parable for the dark side of female desire, it's weirdly powerful.
60
New York Daily News
Elizabeth Weitzman
It's disappointing when a big-screen romance can't match up to the one in your imagination, at any age.
60
The Hollywood Reporter
Kirk Honeycutt
An underwhelming vampire romance long on camp but short on emotional insight
60
The New York Times
Manohla Dargis
Though Edward and Bella reach certain heights in Twilight, notably during a charming scene that finds them leaping from piney treetop to treetop against the spectacular wilderness backdrop, the story’s moral undertow keeps dragging them down.
58
Portland Oregonian
Marc Mohan
Every generation gets the cinematic vampires it deserves...The current decade, judging from the bloodsuckers on display in Twilight, will be remembered as one of guilt, restraint and denial. It's just not that fun to be undead anymore.
50
Chicago Reader
J.R. Jones
This adaptation of the best-selling novel by Stephenie Meyer never rises above the level of a teen soaper on the CW, and its pale, sulky boy toys (Kellan Lutz, Peter Facinelli, Jackson Rathbone) are more silly than scary.
50
Baltimore Sun
Michael Sragow
The movie is mainly geared to putting new twists on what John Hughes comedies used to call "sucking face." It will satisfy Meyer's devotees.
50
New York Post
Kyle Smith
Edward's a remarkable young gentleman when you consider the hell he's been through: It turns out he's always 17, his fate to keep repeating high school, forever and ever. If that's my only option, kindly burn me at the stake.
50
Premiere
Jenni Miller
The religious symbolism couldn't be more obvious (or disturbing). Keep your religion out of our vampires, Hollywood!
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Rick Groen
Sometimes sensitive and often silly but really, essentially, beneath his pallor and her panting and their intertwined frustrations, it's just two long hours of coitus interruptus.
50
USA Today
Claudia Puig
Despite questionable casting, wooden acting, laughable dialogue and truly awful makeup, nothing is likely to stop young girls from swarming to this kitschy adaptation of Stephenie Meyer's popular novel.
50
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Travis Nichols
Those who want something to really sink their teeth into should head home on a rainy day, put on some goth anthems and reread the books.
50
Variety
Justin Chang
A disappointingly anemic tale of forbidden love that should satiate the pre-converted but will bewilder and underwhelm viewers who haven't devoured Stephenie Meyer's bestselling juvie chick-lit franchise.
50
Village Voice
Chuck Wilson
In the 17-million-copy land of "Twilight," the calling card isn't blood and fangs, but the exquisite, shimmering quiver of unconsummated first love. By that measure, the movie version gives really good swoon.
42
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Genevieve Koski
While the movie attempts to find an compelling middle ground between gothic supernaturalism and teenage romance, it usually winds up stumbling into the inane territory implied by both descriptions.
42
Christian Science Monitor
Robert Koehler
A young and as-yet-unformed actor, Stewart is cast in a role she's simply not ready for, and her effort to work hard – exactly what any actor must hide from the audience – is painfully visible in every scene. By contrast, Pattinson is smooth as glass, a born movie star who only needs to slant his eyes to grab attention.
40
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
In a film that has the courage of its absurdity but not much else, Mr. Pattinson gets the best of what passes for style.
30
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
I've had mosquito bites that were more passionate than this undead, unrequited, and altogether unfun pseudo-romantic riff on Romeo and Juliet.
30
Film Threat
Pete Vonder Haar
Q: When is a vampire not a vampire?
A: When it goes out in daylight, sees itself in a mirror, doesn’t drink human blood, and still manages to suck.
The average user rating for this movie is 6.1 (out of 10) based on 298 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Read more user comments...
Discuss this movie in our forums |
|