In her column for Movies.com, Laura explores the history of the Twilight Saga DVD’s. Which are the fan favorites, stand-out moments, and what is missing.

The one item that fans seem to universally want is actor commentary by the three leads: Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, and Taylor Lautner. The original Twilight DVD featured commentary by director Catherine Hardwicke, Pattinson, and Stewart. All of them were relative rookies in the commentary process at that time. There was a refreshing honesty in the playful banter and downright quirkiness that went on. It wasn’t canned, and it embraced the cheesier moments of the film. Pattinson’s self-deprecating comments such as, “Looking scary with a baseball outfit on and a little bouffant, you know, it just does not work. Especially with sculpted eyebrows … I’m really scary in reality…” endeared fans to him all the more. People felt as if they were watching the film with their friends commenting.

Check out the rest on Movies.com

Back in December, Laura started a countdown of iconic movie moments from the Twilight saga. Here’s the follow up story on Movies.com covering the moments from Breaking Dawn Part 1.

Right away the wedding leaps to mind when talking about iconic Breaking Dawn images. After all, the wedding is what the entire series was leading up to. So, is there a way to say that there is a single, definable moment at that wedding? Actually, there’s not one, but two.

As much press as the wedding reveal dress received, one iconic moment seems not to be the dress unveiling so much as Kristen Stewart and Billy Burke’s intimate dialogue where the nervous Bella says, “Don’t let me fall,” and Charlie responds, “Never”.  It was one of the first tear jerker moments for many fans.

The second wedding moment came post-ceremony with Edward’s speech. After a number of double entendre toasts from Emmett, and Charlie making thinly veiled references to his prowess with firearms, viewers get a sincere moment as Edward explains what the marriage means to him. This very public declaration of love stands out amongst the lavish wedding montage. It‘s a rare moment of total honesty from Edward that gives it iconic status.

Now if fans were looking forward to the wedding, they were doubly looking forward to the honeymoon. Online debate raged over wanting an R-rated cut. Could PG-13 be sexy enough? Would the memorable scenes of the book come through? Here is where the movie delivered both an iconic book scene and delivered a new one.

In the books there is a fade to black when it comes to the specifics of the honeymoon. In the movie version, we were able to see more (well, as much as PG-13 will let you see) and in doing do we hit what may be the iconic moment of Part 1. That would be the headboard crack heard ’round the world.  As soon as the teaser was shown, it was the image on thousands of icons and animated gifs. Team Headboard tee shirts sprung up. About the only thing that didn’t happen was the headboard having its own Twitter account.

 

Let us know what you think the iconic movie moments from Breaking Dawn Part 1 was in the comments. Read the whole story at Movies.com.

Laura decided to try and tackle a top ten list this week for her regular Breaking Dawn column and discovered it was going to be harder than she realized.

It’s that time of year when everyone seems to be making a top ten list, so why don’t we jump into the mix too. The Twilight Saga has so many possibilities when it comes to top moments. I started out writing an overall Top Ten Twilight Saga Iconic Moments list taking into account all the Twilight Saga movies, but quickly realized I was going to have to totally rethink that idea because The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 has so many iconic moments just by itself. This was definitely destined to be a two-part idea. So for this week, let’s take a look at the Top Ten Twilight Saga Iconic Film Moments leading up to Breaking Dawn Part 1. Then, in my next column, we’ll examine the Breaking Dawn Part 1-specific ones.

1. The original Twilight movie has possibly the most iconic image of the series. It’s the moment where both Bella and Edward are entranced with each other right after Edward saves Bella from Tyler’s out-of-control van. For many fans who didn’t know anything about Twilight until they saw the films, that was the moment that hooked them. They became captivated by Robert Pattinson and/or the Bella and Edward love story right there during those intense few seconds.

2. One of the most parodied parts of the entire series is the infamous moment in the meadow of “Say it out loud. Vampire.” If you ask people who aren’t fans of the series for a Twilight Saga moment that stands out in their minds, this one is easily it. Even though we don’t get the romantic meadow scene as presented in the book, the scene is memorable to fans nonetheless. It’s the big reveal to Bella that confirms what Edwards is, and consequently it’s what drives the action forward from that point on.

3. The final iconic moment in Twilight is the prom with Edward and Bella’s dance at the gazebo. It’s the first truly prolonged, tender moment they have in the films. Iron and Wine’s song Flightless Bird: American Mouth underscored the sequence and became an instant fan favorite. It was now unofficially Bella and Edward’s song, the one that defined who they were to each other. So far, it is the only song to make a comeback on any of the soundtracks. It currently serves as the song at their wedding in Breaking Dawn Part 1.

Check out which other moments made the list on Movies.com (Their commenting system over there is VASTLY improved if you have had trouble before)

So can you believe that Laura is now counting down to movie number two over on her regular every-other-Thursday column over at Movies.com? This week she covers new material not found in the books that was added to the script.

Apologies to David Bowie for this week’s title, but there were — as with any book-to-screen adaptation — several differences between the book and what was portrayed on screen in The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1. Now, certainly no one expects every scene exactly as written in a novel to make it to the screen; inevitably things need to be condensed or left out all together. On the other hand, sometimes there is material that was never in the books to begin with that makes it onto the screen. The question is, given cuts, how effective is this new material when fans feel very protective of the original source?

The first major insertion of new material that leaps to mind in Breaking Dawn: Part 1 is the presence of Irina of the Denali Coven at Bella and Edward’s wedding. As every Twilight fan knows, Irina sets some major wheels into motion in the second half of the novel Breaking Dawn. Since the Denali Coven and their interaction with Laurent wasn’t focused on in New Moon, it left something of a gaping plot hole that had to be addressed. It was interesting to see screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg and director Bill Condon handle this dilemma. They deftly had Irina react to Seth’s presence at the wedding, have a flashback to Laurent, establish Irina’s romantic ties to him, and then have Irina storm off. That’s a lot of material to cover in roughly ninety seconds of film time, but they managed it. By doing so, they set the plot for Breaking Dawn: Part 2 securely on course.

Check out the rest of the article at Movies.com. What is your opinion on highlighted changes and others?

In this week’s Movies.com column, Laura covers the exciting new Twilight products that are out and some that the fans are dying to see in the future.

“What was entirely unexpected was the avalanche of Tweets that happened when I retweeted one fan who suggested that merchandisers were missing a very important product, a Jacob wolf plushie. “I would kill to have a Stephenie Meyer-designed Jacob plushie that wasn’t just any wolf. I’d want one that she says was her vision of Jacob,” responded one ardent fan. Clearly, there is a huge, untapped market there based on the massive number of retweets and comments back that I received. Who knows, maybe for the final film?”

See the entire article on Movies.com

This week in Laura’s Movies.com column she talks about the soundtrack and how fans are reacting to it: the debates, early favorites, and the Muse controversy. She featured some Lexicon commentary to sum up fan reaction around the Internet.

Here’s how she featured Mia Maestro

What’s also interesting is that Breaking Dawn cast member, Mia Maestro, who plays Carmen of the Denali coven has a track on the CD with the very same name as the Bruno Mars song. The only difference is the title is in Spanish. Lloverá means “It will rain”, so there is a question as to whether it’s an entirely new song, a Spanish cover of the Bruno Mars Song, or perhaps a blend of the Bruno Mars’ song and original material. Regardless, this marks the first time a song in Spanish has been used in a Twilight Saga soundtrack. Maestro is mostly known to American fans for her work on Alias, but she is also a talented vocalist who has fantastic range and an earthy quality to her voice. She has sung at festivals around the world.

Check out the entire column on Movies.com