Beautiful Creatures: How Did The Movie Stand Up To The Book; Or, Why The Film Should Be Renamed 'Beautiful Disaster'

How did the movie Beautiful Creatures stand up to the book? To simply say 'it didn't' would be an injustice to fans of the series.

Within the first five minutes of the film I considered both walking out and/or asking in a very unfriendly way for a refund. As the characters that I had been introduced to in the novels were reintroduced to me on the screen, I began to wonder if I had misunderstood the basis of the movie. It quickly became clear to me that the screenwriter had not read the same source material that I had, and to say that he took creative liberties would be like saying Hurricane Katrina was just a minor disturbance in the NOLA night life.

I'm sure, or at least I'd like to believe so, that I'm in good company when I say that I sat there mildly horrified and extremely confused as what unfolded on screen bastardized the world created by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. I left the theater fairly certain that I had read the wrong book. Either that, or I was intoxicated, because clearly what I had just seen was not the Beautiful Creatures that I had read. A thought that occurred only seconds before remembering that I had already promised a co-worker that I would come back and see the movie with her, assuring her earlier that day with: "I definitely will want to see this one more than once."

From the Southern accents that were overdone to a point where they became almost comedic to the combining/elimination of key characters to the complete disregard for the original story, I can only be sure that the movie was loosely based on some parts of the book series - and then placed somewhat out of order.

Without completely over analyzing for you a movie that missed the mark by several large continents at the very least, let me run down a few of the elements that were missing or ignored and ultimately led to this enormous fail - starting with Ethan making his own eggs.

• Where was Marian? Or, more appropriately where was the real Amma? The most obvious error in judgement was combining the characters of Amma and Marian. In the book, Amma is a seer. She is also Ethan's housekeeper/nanny/maternal figure. As the series goes on, Amma takes on an added importance that cannot be duplicated or combined with that of another character. She is the catalyst for a series of events that transforms the entire story. Equally important, but in an altogether different way, is the guidance that Ethan gets from Marian. Marian is his deceased mother's best friend and colleague. She uses her unique knowledge as a Keeper to guide Ethan with his Caster-related dilemmas. Both of these characters are essential in the three remaining books - Beautiful Darkness, Beautiful Chaos, and Beautiful Redemption.

• Macon has a heart - and then the movie crushed it. Yes, if you read the book you already know that Lena's uncle, Macon Ravenwood's one true love was Ethan's mother, Lila Evers. However, this is a book two revelation that comes as part of a bigger storyline - a revelation which has now been stripped of its proper placement and butchered without so much as adding anything to the movie itself.

• Why reinvent the wheel? Not only were the big things too much to keep intact, apparently so were the details. Lena's necklace is supposed to be a chunky eye-sore that she never took off. Caster eyes are always green. Macon is an incubus - not a caster - who can't go out in the daylight and uses his dog, Boo Radley, to keep tabs on things. Larkin is really a dark caster. Ridley has long blonde hair with pink streaks and sucks on lollipops all day long. Ethan's father is a shut in. Uncle Abner loves 'Wild Turkey' whiskey and lemon meringue pie. Any of this ringing a bell? Well, if you didn't read the book it wouldn't since none of it made the cut. Some of these details could have easily been included without any extra work.

After now seeing the movie not once, but twice, I have very few positive thoughts to offer. Besides the aforementioned problems with the content, the film itself was disjointed, overacted, poorly cast and just plain, unforgivingly bad. The only thing that it unquestionably has going for it is that it looks good visually. The Director of Photography should be commended for the stellar shots and I'm sure there's a location scout or two that deserve a high five. Unfortunately, audiences will forgive a film that is shot poorly in exchange for a compelling story, not the other way around. The story literally felt as if someone had read the back cover and decided to write a screenplay about it. I'm not sure exactly where the disconnect took place, but if this was supposed to be based on the novel of the same name, 'Beautiful Disaster' would have been a more appropriate title.

I hope that someone, somewhere learns from this mistake and decides in a couple of years to start back at the drawing board. This book was written for cinematic release and required very few changes to have been a success, and if done the right way absolutely could be one in the future. Take heed, fans of book series will swarm behind the finished product if it even feels like you tried to give them what they want.

For more in the way of an official review of the film, check out Jonathan Lack's (Denver Post Columnist) via We Got This Covered. My favorite quote from his review is "For the record, Beautiful Creatures only gets a full star because it is the lowest our review system will allow me to assign. "

*Update: Furthermore, there was no kelting, sixteen moons song, crossword puzzles, or red hots..

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 Is A Long Title..

Now that I have experienced The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1..twice, I feel that I am more qualified to have an opinion. 

The first time I saw the film was at midnight (well, 12:10) on opening night, a tradition that I started with New Moon.  And, just like the last two middle of the night movie forays, I left slightly disappointed.  It's not that I didn't like the film - but I didn't immediately love it.  There wasn't that instant, jaw-dropping moment as the credits rolled down the screen that I wanted to have.  I'm not sure if it was that exhaustion had set in at that point, or that my mind was still consumed in dissecting the differences that exist between the cinematic version and the novel.  Either way, it always takes me at least a couple viewings to decide whether I really liked it or not.

Critics are always quick to dismiss the Twilight films, like those in academia do for the books.  I, on the other hand, can appreciate the escapist feelings that the novels invoked and the attempt to translate that into a visual format.

I must say that after seeing the film for a second time, I am more likely to give it some praise.  There were definitely moments from the book that I would have liked to see expanded on screen, i.e. the scene between Jacob (Taylor Lautner) and Edward (Robert Pattinson) on the driveway after Jacob discovers Bella (Kristen Stewart) is pregnant.  It is supposed to be an enormously complex emotional scene between these two guys that hate each other when Jacob finds something to appreciate in Edward's desperate plea - at this point in the text, we are seeing things from Jacob's point of view.  Jacob describes Edward as a "burning man" and feels this uncontrollable surge of empathy for his situation.  Instead, we get a fairly pathetic, "hey man, can you talk to Bella?" type of scenario.

As for realism, the birth scene - incredible. Bella looked like a corpse for sure, it was quite a sickening sight. As for the dress they choose for her when she is transforming into a vampire - another scene that could have been spoofed up with some additional dialogue, even if it was just Bella's internal monologue, like in the book - wouldn't have been my first choice. The color is darling, but I thought it would have been more flattering to her new "perfect" physique.

Other than that, there were some funny scenes.  Any of them with Charlie (Billy Burke) in it is almost a guaranteed laugh out loud moment!  He is just amazing at delivering those one liners.  The honeymoon after Edward decides that sex is out gets pretty funny as well.  His attempts to distract Bella from naughty thoughts and exhaust her are definitely amusing.

Overall, I give it a solid B (which may or may not improve after I see

it another dozen or so times).  But, let's face it, even if the movie was a total drag, I would have seen it multiple times in theaters and bought every version of it when it hits DVD. 

Transformers 3: Epic or Epic Failure?

I sat down to take in the latest (final?) installment of the Transformers franchise last Friday and the first thought I had as I slipped into those mildly stained, red-ish theater seats was this:

What is this movie supposed to be about?

It occurred to me only after I (and by I, I mean someone else) coughed up the $12.50 to see the 3-D version of Michael Bay's latest Blockbuster, that I had no idea what the premise of the movie was.  Other than the Super Bowl commercial that gave away the first 30-seconds or so of the film, the only ads I'd seen simply showed things blowing up.  Despite being an energetic fan* of the first two films, I had my reserves about the third after the press release came out confirming the exit of lead actress Megan Fox.  I may not be her biggest fan, but I'm not to proud to admit that there was a certain chemistry between her and Shia that added to my viewing pleasure.

I won't bore you with a recap of the plot, but my two biggest complaints with it centered mainly on the lack of Fox's character.

1)  The absence of Michaela (Megan Fox) was skirted under the rug as "she dumped me" which was mentioned twice in the early part of the movie with no further explanation.  It seems odd that after Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen where the big plot finish involved the two lead characters finally proclaiming their love to each other that a) she would just dump him, and b) he would so easily jump into this obviously serious relationship with Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley).  Which brings me to point dos.

2)  I believe the whole I'm-not-going-to-say-I-Love-You-first-and-instead-wait-until-we-save-the-world plot line was exhausted in the last installment.  I feel like I just watched all of the same events take place with a different leading lady, and a slightly different - but not really - threat to humanity.      

The rest of the film kind of blended together in my mind as an epic disappointment.**  

*I went to see the last film 4 times in theaters (including opening day), that's 4 times folks!

**The highlight of the film for me was the 6 seconds of screen time the abandoned Methodist Church in Gary, Indiana that the Altered movie filmed at received.