Posts Tagged ‘FEARnet’

20 Differences Between ‘New Moon’ and the Book

Any diehard Twilight fan will tell you that there were a number of differences from the New Moon book and movie. A recent article on FEARnet put together 20 reasons the movie deviates from the book.

Screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg faced an interesting challenge adapting Meyer’s 500+ page novel for the screen. Here are just some of the 20 reasons, click here to read the full article.

(Warning: Spoilers ahead!)

We get more fights, including an awesome Volturi throw down.
New Moon the book is infamous for its slow pacing, thanks to Bella’s crippling depression (see below). So it’s a good thing that the film throws in fistfights, wolf skirmishes, and chase scenes to liven things up a bit more. Our favorite: watching Volturi guard Felix put the smack down on our precious Edward, a scene crafted for the film

Bella’s (a little) less mopey than she is in the books.
Much of the book is devoted to Bella’s heartbreaking, months-long break-up depression, so it’s a good thing that the film condenses her lost period a bit for the sake of storytelling. Critics complain already that Bella spends so much time staring into space, pining over Edward; if only they knew how much more we/she suffer in the books! Thankfully, Rosenberg’s script snaps Bella out of her funk and moves on, sort of, in a relatively short span of time

Jacob gives Bella a dream catcher.
One new scene in the film has Jacob giving Bella a dream catcher for her birthday, killing two birds with one stone in the process: giving her a present when Edward feels he cannot and putting the mack on her with a big bear hug right in front of Edward. Bella hangs the dream catcher above her pillow, but unfortunately for her, it doesn’t help keep the nightmares away.

Edward proposes!
Rosenberg saves the best for last, leaving Bella (and us) with the biggest possible cliffhanger. Again, the re-jiggered placement of the scene works better cinematically, and leads into the next film, Eclipse!

Exclusive: screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg interview on New Moon.

Here is an exclusive interview brought to you by FEARnet with Melissa Rosenberg, one of the screenwriters discussing the twilight sequeal “New Moon”.

FearNet: Have you seen the final cut of New Moon yet?

Melissa Rosenberg: I saw an early cut of it, yeah. Some of the special effects weren’t there, stuff like that. But I have to tell you, it’s funny because for writers, and for me – I often will dread a director’s cut. As a writer, you have already seen the movie in your head. And the movie in your head costs a gazillion dollars; you can’t actually make the movie in your head, but you’ve seen it. And so, a director’s cut is almost always a disappointment because it’s not what you’ve seen in your head. It can be a major adjustment, it’s not what’s in my head but this one’s different, but as good.

When I saw Chris’s cut, about ten minutes into the movie I started smiling. I thought to myself, I get to put my name on this. It was just so thrilling. It’s really good. I have to tell you, in all sincerity, it’s really good.

I saw you last on a set visit to New Moon’s Vancouver stages, and you had just arrived to watch the dailies. You seemed really pleased with what you were seeing from the Volturi scenes in particular.

Yes, and that was on a sound stage. The big screen version really lives up to it. It just looks lush and beautiful; it looks like a big movie. And the budget didn’t increase that significantly. Harry Potter budgets are what, $150-200 million? This is half of that, at least.

FearNet: You’ve added a few scenes to New Moon that weren’t in the book, like the one where Jacob gives Bella a gift of a dream catcher. Can you tell us about that?

Melissa Rosenberg: Actually, I got the idea from a writer friend of mine. I was searching around for that moment… You had to establish the relationship between Bella and Jacob; he can give her gifts and Edward can’t. The sort of easy friendship with the two of them, and yet also, show that Jacob actually has feelings for her. He sort of casually presents the dream catcher, but really he’s shopped around for it for quite a while. I wanted it to be something that was special to him and his culture, and it was so thematic to Bella; the movie is laden with her dreams. Her dream life is a very rich part of the film. So thematically, it really blended well. I thank my friend for coming up with that.

FearNet: What’s one of your favorite new scenes or extended scenes that you’ve written into New Moon?

Melissa Rosenberg: One of my favorites is actually the end, when they go to Volterra and confront a couple of Volturi. In the book, the conflict in that scene is verbal; there is an attack on Edward by Jane, and it works in the book, it’s beautiful in the book. It’s never acted out; it never explodes. For the movie, because it’s a visual medium, I felt like I wanted to externalize that conflict more, turn it into more of a battle. So it’s the same scenario, it’s just enacted and externalized. We get to see an actual fight.

FearNet: Did the proposal scene make it into New Moon?

Melissa Rosenberg: The proposal comes into the end of New Moon, and that is the first proposal. Absolutely in Eclipse, the proposal when they’re on the bed, yes — to me, that was a quintessential scene from the book. When Edward gets on his knees, with his mother’s ring, and she says yes — that was one of the most romantic scenes that Stephenie wrote in all four books.