10 Best Twilight Moments
Twilight is a cultural sensation. It offers a timeless soundtrack, a talented and attractive young cast, and is based on Stephenie Meyer’s best-selling novel of the same name. It is a comforting watch for chilly autumn nights. Although often criticised for its questionable acting decisions, Twilight remains widely adored and frequently referenced (Hotel Transylvania, Turning Red, What We Do In the Shadows).
Following Bella (Kristen Stewart) as she adapts to moving across the country to live with her dad (Billy Burke), Twilight is a love story complete with forbidden relationships, dark secrets, and teenage angst. We watch as Bella meets Edward (Robert Pattinson), a mysterious boy who disappears a lot and seems to have a strange fascination with Bella.
In this Movie List from The Film Magazine, we are counting down the most memorable, most heart-wrenching, most romantic, and most Twilight moments from Catherine Hardwicke’s 2008 teen megahit. These are the 10 Best Twilight Moments.
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10. The Opening
“I’d never given much thought to how I would die.”
A powerful first scene is crucial to any good movie, and Twilight executes its opening in such a way that it captivates us from the get-go.
The film opens with a deer in a forest, the classic Twilight filter shading the scene into a gloomy grey-blue. As we’re watching this deer from behind, Bella’s voice comes in. She talks about how dying in the place of someone she loves seems like a good way to go, and we watch as the deer is attacked by something. Short and bittersweet, this opening seems to promise us that our leading lady, who we’ve yet to meet, is going to die. Akin to “Romeo and Juliet”, the rest of the story is plagued by questions of ‘how’ and ‘when’.
This is the moment it all started. The very scene when an entire generation of people grew to love Twilight. Even before Catherine Hardwicke’s film introduced any characters, the general ambience of Twilight was apparent, and was more than enough to generate excitement among those willing to go along for the ride.
9. Bella Runs Away from Forks
“If I don’t get out now, then I’m just going to be stuck here like mom.”
Charlie Swan: father, friend, unsung hero, and quite possibly the only sensible character in this film. From the moment we meet Charlie it is clear that he cares, even if that is in an awkward ‘dad’ kind of way.
When Bella moves in with her dad he makes an effort to comment on Bella’s hair and mumbles about how he asked for help at the store to pick out some new bedding for her. Throughout the film we see him making sure his daughter is well-equipped with pepper spray, and eyeing up Edward in the protective way that fathers do. Having witnessed Bella and Charlie go through all this together in an effort to build their relationship, it’s all the more devastating when Bella tells Charlie she has to leave, and that she doesn’t want to end up ‘stuck there like [her] mum’ was.
No matter how many times we see this scene, and how many times we tell ourselves that it’s just what has to be done to keep Charlie safe and that Bella doesn’t really mean it, it is still so painful to watch. Perhaps it is the fact that Charlie isn’t clued into the trouble with the vampires, or the fact that we don’t get to see an apology from Bella, but this scene is just so incredibly heart-wrenching.
This is one of those moments that you hope will simply not happen upon every rewatch, but alas it always does.
