The day after the midnight premiere, I slept in late. I gathered my thoughts, wrote a few blog entries, and prepared to see another showing of Eclipse at 4:20 PM. I thought that there would be a huge crowd at this showing as well. Afterall, there had been hundreds of fans at the theatre the other night, and those were only the ones who had the willpower to stay up until two in the morning! That is why I was shocked when I showed up at the movie one hour early to find an empty waiting room, and then an empty theatre. Perhaps 4:20 PM on a Wednesday was just a bad time to go. Afterall, it was vacation for school-age and college-age students, but they had probably gone to the midnight premiere. Those who had not gone would likely have to wait until their parents got home from work to drive them to the theatre in the evening. And of course, it was not vacation for most adults in the world. Still, because of the magnitude of the phenomenon, I had expected a crowd.
After waiting in the theatre alone for about forty-five minutes, a group of about ten little girls came in. They appeared to be no older than ten, possibly younger. Behind them was one set of parents, lugging a huge bag of Claires merchandise and trying to keep the group organized. One girl was wearing a sparkly tiara and it appeared to be her birthday. The parents seemed to have their hands full, and I didn’t want to interrupt the little girls’ fun by coming over, a stranger, to talk to them. So, I resigned myself to sit back and simply observe the fact that Eclipse was being used as a birthday party for elementary school aged girls.
Tagging along with the group of girls was a pair of slightly older boys, perhaps twelve years old. They were probably somehow related to the birthday girl and just here for the ride. They chose to sit right in front of me, and although I felt like a spy, I did enjoy listening into their conversation. One boy said, “They are going to make zero profit on this. The place is empty. You know, they spent a lot of product on this movie. So much for that!” I giggled, wondering what he meant by “product” and if he had heard about the crowds at the midnight premiere. This boy then instructed his friend to only eat popcorn when Edward came on screen. As the other boy put a piece of popcorn in his mouth, the first boy quickly snatched the bag away. “What did I tell you? Only when Edward comes out!”
After the girls settled down, and the parents chose a seat about five rows behind them, a pair of young adult women came in and sat right behind me. I decided to turn around and start a conversation, and then to let them know about my project. I’m not typically very talkative, but at this point, I didn’t really have a choice. It turned out that these two girls were college students, a little bit older than me. They had both read Twilight, but their friends thought they were weird for liking it. Both of them had seen the other movies but did not proclaim to be big fans. They didn’t have much to say, except for the fact that they liked the books and wanted to see how they turned out as movies. It seemed that I wasn’t going to find very many dedicated fans at this showing, so I just relaxed and enjoyed the movie. This time, without the screams and laughter, I actually heard all of the lines. Knowing what to expect, I was able to stop analyzing and just enjoy the emotion. It was a nice, calming experience.
I skipped Thursday, deciding to catch a crowd on Friday night. When I did go to the theatre, again, it was pretty empty. But fans began to come in around half an hour before the movie, and there ended up being around fifty to one hundred people there. Since they came late rather than lining up hours in advance, I didn’t have much of a chance to interview them. One pair of college aged girls gladly obliged me to have a discussion about Twilight. I didn’t really have to guide the conversation—they were happy to tell me anything and everything about their relationship with the Twilight Saga. One girl said that she was depressed while reading the second book, New Moon, because Edward left Bella. That is why both girls were Team Jacob. In their opinion, Bella never gives Jacob a chance, Edward leaves Bella, and anyways, Jacob has a hot body. Both girls said that they like Edward, but emphasized that Jacob was always there for Bella.
One girl continued, saying that she had pictured Bella differently. To her, Kristen Stewart is blank in the movie, while Bella displays a variety of dramatic and deep emotions in the book. She then went off on a hysterical tangent about how Taylor Lautner had once friended a bunch of people from her high school on Facebook, before he became famous, and his profile picture had been a photo of him from Sharkboy and Lavagirl. Then, after the Twilight movies, this girl had checked to see if she was still friends with him. Unfortunately, it appeared that he had unfriended her and her other friends. I’m not quite sure why she told this story, but it does go to show the celebrity power that Twilight has bestowed upon these young actors. This girl would not have told the story if her previous association with Taylor Lautner meant nothing.
After launching into the Facebook story, this girl explained that she had read the books all four in a row in about a week. It was a suspensful story, and she said that the love triangle pulled her in. But, after she was finished, she calmed down and hadn’t read them again. When I asked about the Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, she said that she might read it some day. In terms of the upcoming film, she was most excited to see the fight scene with the newborns. She said that there is a difference between the books and the movies, and that, like her, some fans were just there to compare. I’m not sure how this came up, but she also made sure to tell me that she absolutely hates Harry Potter. That interested me, because many Twilight fans are also Harry Potter fans, and vice versa. The points of similarity and difference between these two phenomena would be interesting to explore.
With only about ten minutes left before the movie, I quickly approached a mother and daughter sitting together. I was expecting an interesting tale of intergenerational love for the Twilight Saga, but what I got was much different. The daugher said that she had read Twilight recently, after seeing an ad for it in a magazine. The mother hadn’t read the series, but she had seen Robert Pattinson on television. The only thing she could say about him was that he is a “bad interviewer.”
The daughter hadn’t liked the first movie at all, mostly because it was low budget and poorly made. That was the reason why she stopped reading the books. When I asked why both of them were drawn to the saga, and why they had come to the movie, the mother quickly responded, “It’s the hype.” In fact, she stays up to date on Twilight by following interviews and programs on the telvision, like Jay Leno. Perhaps fan communities, once they become large enough, have a multiplier effect. The more noticeable they become, the more others simply want to know whats going on to feel like they belong. Has Twilight become like that?
Neither woman could decide which team they were on. Still, they mostly talked about Jacob. They mentioned his looks and said that they felt like they were looking out for him. Predictably, they were excited for the Tent Scene. I certainly hope they enjoyed it!
Student L
Twilight Anthropology 