In cinemas now [M]

Director: Chris Weitz

Runtime: 130mins

Movies with werewolves in them are pretty good fun. I mean, Teen Wolf is classic Michael J Fox, always awesome when you stumble across it late at night on TV. The same goes for vampires – whether it’s something arty like Let The Right One In, or a more traditional splatter-fest like 30 Days Of Night, vampire flicks are traditionally pretty hard to mess up. So, if you take a hunky werewolf and a broody vampire dude, then put them in a movie where the teen heroine has to choose between them, you should be on to something pretty good, right? Ladies and gentlemen, I give you New Moon.

I’m not going to recount too much of the film’s plot here, but basically, you have an abstinent, hundred-and-eight year-old vampire dude (Edward, played by Robert Pattinson), who is dating the sulkiest teenager in America (Bella, Kristen Stewart). When Edward skips town abruptly, Bella starts spending time with her friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner), who’s cute and a nice guy and knows how to do things like fix motorbikes, although he displays certain werewolf tendencies, and warns Bella not to make him angry lest he bare his claws and beat the shit out of her. Also, the absent Edward frequently appears to Bella in visions, warning her to behave herself or else. I really wish I was kidding about this, but I’m not.

Director Chris Weitz does a pretty good job of pulling the whole thing together – he colours the film with a lush palette, including flashes of vivid, blood red, and stages a pretty cool action sequence involving a wolf pack chasing a vampire through the forest. The supporting cast, likewise, is great – Taylor Lautner is super hot as the shirtless werewolf, and Michael Sheen gives a wonderfully bug-eyed performance as a vampire elder. Stewart and Pattinson, however, display almost no onscreen chemistry as the central lovers – both have acted just fine in other things, so I’m assuming that their performances represent some sort of protest against the movie’s creepy power dynamics. I hope so, anyway.

Speaking of creepy power dynamics, I’m just going to leave you with this. At one point, one of Jacob’s werewolf brothers introduces Bella to his wife – meek and apologetic, she once dared to piss him off, and has deep scars all down one side of her face to show for it.

ALASDAIR DUNCAN