MovieChat Forums > Vampires Suck (2010) Discussion > I give it a D+ for missing too many oppo...

I give it a D+ for missing too many opportunities

posted 13 years ago by zingbot1000
4 replies | jump to latest

As nice as it is to see something making fun of Twilight, I feel like this parody missed too many opportunities and kept recycling dumb jokes (throwing stuff at Bella, hurting Bella).

I kept waiting for them to do a bit about how creepy it is that a several hundred year old man is stalking an underage girl; a Dateline To Catch a Predator gag would have been hilarious!

I also would have loved them to point out how fracked up it is that Jacob is actually in love not with Bella but with Bella and Edward's unborn baby. There surely are some good laughs in that.

And while they touched on the fact that Twilight appeals to pubescent girls because Edward has to remain chaste but desperately in lust, they could have done so much with the fact that it was fashioned this way because the author it a Mormon.

And some jokes about what a horrendously emotionally abusive relationship they have and what a terrible message Twilight sends to girls (give up your future and your dreams of college to be with some guy you met a year ago) etc.

Don't get me wrong: it was pretty funny. But I feel like they could have traded in some of those lamer, less inspired jokes for stuff that actually pokes at WHY Twilight is actually so terrible.

Oh, and instead of having Edward kiss that evil vampire guy, they should have Edward and Jacob. That would have been amusing.

[–] The_Mogwai_To_End_All_Mogwais 13 years ago

wait, wait, what? you expected something from this series of movies? theyre awful. the only reason i occasionally see one is cause i leave my tv on HBO or Comedy Central at night and when i come bcak to it one of these cinematic abortions is on and im too tired or busy to change the channel.

i dont think ive ever found anything in any of there movies funny and the only thing thats ever broken the lame-unfunny mold was that scene with with Alvin and Chipmunks in Disaster movie which was just disturbing.

this movie hardly even made fun of Twilight, they were just rehashing scenes from them, but with goofier faces.

-If Irony were Strawberries we would all be drinking smoothies right now.

[–] Heretic_Of_Jeff_Bezos 13 years ago

wait, wait, what? you expected something from this series of movies? theyre awful.

You know what else is awful? Your grammar. It's "they're". I'll admit that these are not films that are easily understood, but they are the best pieces of satire since Voltaire's "Candide". Just because you didn't understand them, doesn't give you a right to bash them indiscriminately.

You see, Seltzer and Friedberg make avant-garde art films in a style of Dadaism, and defy the very definition of what a traditional movie is. The rejection of film is as much of an art as the art of cinema. For instance, you mentioned the chipmunk scene and didn't even bother to give an in-depth analysis:

The first song the chipmunks sing is a happy Christmas song. The next one isn't happy but isn't disturbing. The third one they sing is a destructive punk rock song. This is an allegory for how modern music is corrupting the pure-at-heart children, just like many people warned would happen in the 50s.

The chipmunks are so influenced by singing the song, that they develop hyper-rabies and believe it okay to start being violent. They attack the pregnant girl, which illustrates that the music is so influential, it not only causes violence on the current generation, but also to the next. by having the other three just watch, it is illustrated that many people are complacent about the negative influence rock is having, even though they've seen lives destroyed first-hand.

I had to watch the scene about 7 or 8 times before I understood it. It is truly magnificent how many layers are put in these types of films.

[–] firebug321 13 years ago

Oh, you!

[–] dr-strangeno24 13 years ago

Honestly, I give it points for not going that route, mostly because the whole Twilight hatedom seems to revolve so much around such points that they've been played out by amateur literary reviewers. The typical criticisms of Twilight are so ubiquitous, and often sanctimonious, that there's hardly a chance to play them as truly "funny."

Though the movie didn't work too well overall, I think Seltzer and Friedberg were probably the best guys to tackle such a project, if only for the virtue that they find neither series' rabid fans nor raging critics to be "in the right." They parody on their own passively dumb nothing-is-sacred terms, neither giving two damns about how sweet Twilight fans find the love story, nor about how critics cry that Bella set feminism back 500 years.

S&F basically made a stupid movie around a franchise which both fans and critics take too damn seriously, which to me is laudable as the most anti-drama and mutually "profane" way of going about things. In fact, I'd say the biggest reason the movie failed (on an ideological level anyhow) was because the Twilight supporters didn't seem to recognize how dumb/irreverent the movie was (Jacob: "Contract says I have to take my shirt off now"; Twilight fan: "yea hes pretty sexay lol").