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Twilight Was Just What an Oversexualized Generation Needed
In its depictions of teenage desire, the series took a cue from chaste high-school movies of long ago.
Earlier teen movie stars like Mickey Rooney, James Dean, and Molly Ringwald had committed, even lunatic fans, but they didn’t have to deal with the blast furnace attention of contemporary “fandoms,” in which collective passions, enabled and unleashed by social media, foster a sense of ownership and entitlement. Pattinson is more mannered, his sangfroid studied but effective; at times he seems to be channeling Luke Perry’s Dylan McKay from Beverly Hills 90210, yet another in the long line of sensitive, brooding, misunderstood pretty boys descended from Dean’s Jim Stark — which suggests that 103-year-old Edward has at least kept up with teen culture. I don’t want to overstate the case for Twilight as a film, but you have to admire the skill of everyone involved in creating such an effective picture given the limitations — a significant one being that the screenplay gives Edward no real reason for falling in love with Bella beyond her scent, though in fairness, many adolescent romances have been born of less, even if those relationships tend to be measured in months or weeks, rather than eternity.
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