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Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn--Part 1, The (12A)

Adventure, Drama, Fantasy

The Quileute and the Volturi close in on expecting parents Edward and Bella, whose unborn child poses different threats to the wolf pack and vampire coven.


The critical consensus

A formless, gormless soap opera: it’s a humourless, incoherent bore that lives down to the very worst stereotypes associated with the franchise.

*(*)(*)(*)(*)Robbie Collin, The Telegraph, 16/11/2011

Twi-hards will lap it up but even they might quietly admit that key elements have been distilled to disappointing effect.

**(*)(*)(*)Rob Carnevale, The Herald, 17/11/2011

Breaking down, more like it.

*(*)(*)(*)(*)Chris Tookey, Daily Mail, 18/11/2011

The acting’s better than it’s ever been, but with the best will in the world, this can’t get past the fact that the story’s demented.

**(*)(*)(*)Helen O'Hara, Empire Online, 18/11/2011

Breaking Waters, more like, given the big event in this first part of the Twilight saga's conclusion.

*(*)(*)(*)(*)Anthony Quinn, The Independent, 18/11/2011

Let’s hope they can wrap everything up with a better film than this one.

**(*)(*)(*)Allan Hunter, Daily Express, 18/11/2011

That appalled fascination with sex remains a sticking point, cuing a final, surprisingly intense eruption of gyno-horror. Yet in director Bill Condon’s skilled hands, this instalment proves more intimate, confining its action to kids in rooms wrestling with the consequences of their own crushes.

***(*)(*)Mike McCahill, The Scotsman, 18/11/2011

It’s easily the most uneven of the saga, containing some of its daftest moments and some of its best.

***(*)(*)Daily Record, 18/11/2011

Darker, sexier, sharper – a neat next step.

Aisla Caine, Little White Lies, 18/11/2011

It raises more laughs at the back of the stalls than hairs on the back of the neck.

Philip French, The Observer, 20/11/2011

While Condon is as uneasy with his few action scenes as his predecessors and has equally little idea of what to do with those tiresome werewolves, he plays the core story with confidence and some delightful shafts of humour.

Sunday Herald, 20/11/2011

Flat performances, dodgy plotting and rubbish talking wolves aside, this is a weirdly grim addition to the supposedly tween-friendly franchise, less fairy tale than misjudged horror show.

**(*)(*)(*)Emma Dibdin, Total Film, 17/11/2011


Features about Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn--Part 1, The (12A)

Twilight Breaking Dawn sparks 'convulsing, snorting' seizures in US cinemas

Xan Brooks, The Guardian, 25/11/2011

Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn--Part 1, The (12A)

Where and when?

General release. Check local listings for show times.

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