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A ministry of the ChildCare Action Project: Christian Analysis of American Culture (CAP Ministry) A 501(c)(3) Nonprofit Christian Ministry. www.capalert.com/ Entertainment Media Analysis Report A service to His little ones through you in His name by His Word MAR2010.025  With Comparative (2010), PG-13 [Hard R-13*] (1hr 55min) The #1 Christian entertainment media analysis service on the Internet. We give you OBJECTIVE tools NO ONE ELSE CAN to help YOU make an informed decision for yourself whether a film is fit for your family. Over 1200 analyses for parents, grandparents, pastors, youth leaders and more. |
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(While the Scriptural references are certainly not subjective, my commentary may be and sometimes is somewhat subjective.)
 Cast/Crew Details Courtesy Internet Movie Database Production (US): Summit Entertainment, Temple Hill Entertainment, Maverick Films, Imprint Entertainment, Sunswept Entertainment Distribution (US): Summit Home Entertainment Director(s): David Slade Producer(s): Bill Bannerman, Marty Bowen, Wyck Godfrey, Greg Mooradian, Mark Morgan, Karen Rosenfelt Writing Credits: Screenplay by Melissa Rosenberg; novel by Stephenie Meyer Cinematography/Camera: Javier Aguirresarobe Music: Howard Shore Film Editing: Art Jones, Nancy Richardson Casting: Stuart Aikins, Sean Cossey, Rene Haynes Production Design: Paul D. Austerberry Art Direction: Jeremy Stanbridge Viewed on Summit Home Entertainment DVD  This film analysis is sponsored in part by the generosity of N&KB. Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) continues to plan to give up her soul for "love." She has been undecided until now. The date is set -- August 13. Thirty days before her 18th birthday. It will be interesting, if for no other reason than to see the brown-eyed Bella with rust-orange eyes. Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) and Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) still try to out-testosterone each other with mutual devil-may-care hiss-n-spit and launching piles of innuendo of violence upon each other, threatening to erupt at any moment. But the theatric love they share for the same girl wins. Edward and the rest of the Cullen gang join "forces" with the Quileute werewolves to battle the "newborns" created with an ulterior motive The newborns are newly condemned vampires who possess a hundred times more strength than seasoned vampires which for several months suffer an intensified and unbridled, undisciplined frenzy for blood. Forks teen runaway Riley Biers (Xavier Samuel) has been missing for a year. In one of his moments of independence in the night streets of Seattle 40 miles from his hometown of Forks, Victoria (Bryce Dallas Howard) and her clan attack Riley and change him. Now the runaway Riley is a newborn night shade. Believing Victoria is the love of his un-life ... the ulterior motive ... Riley bites up an army of newborns to serve her lust to kill Bella to get even with Edward who killed Victoria's love, James. Victoria plans to kill the rest of the Cullen clan in the process. Victoria hopes the heightened vamp-energy inherent with the newborns will be her edge to kill Bella and end the Cullen clan. There is a side effect of all the frenzy of the newborn army -- all of the recent killings and disappearances in Seattle perpetrated by Riley and his army has roused the attention of the Volturi who have a presence in this version but not nearly as high voltage as in New Moon. All the killing and disappearances caused by the hunting by the newborns has stirred up the attention of humans. The Volturi must silence the undesirable attention. But due to the werewolves combining forces with the Cullen clan this is the last we will see of Riley ... and of Victoria ... and of a few dozen newborns unless cinematic license violates logic. Now has that ever happened? We'll see. The following image is a comparative as a convenience. It provides a side-by-side comparison of the scoring earned by the six investigation areas (W, I, S, D, O, M) over the three installments of the Twilight trilogy. Of noteworthiness is the softening of the span of scores. Specifically, in Twilight: Eclipse there are no span of scores of zero to 100 (the min-max values) while both of the first two installments earned min-max values of -100. Eclipse earned only a -62 value. This reveals the span if ignominious content of Eclipse to be somewhat less extreme than the first two installments but the lesser final score of Eclipse reveals an increase in assaults on morality and wholesomeness adequate to again warrant the CAP R-13 warning.  There is much more that can be concluded from the above comparative data display built by the content findings but I suspect the caliber of our readership is such that I do not need to belabor all the conclusions possible: that you are quite capable of seeing for yourself all the pieces and parts revealed by this feature of the CAP analysis model.  Above is another descriptive graph visually revealing of the reduction in moral wholesomeness, or moral decay of content, over the three installments (so far) in the Twilight Saga. Each year the content has shown a consistent reduction in moral wholesomeness. Over the span of the triad the degradation is 52%, 22% with New Moon followed by a 67% reduction with Eclipse. Such a trend predicts the final score of the Breaking Dawn installment will be 15 -- another hardcore R-13. We'll see. The CAP analysis model is more revealing than even I suspected it would have when I engineered it. I guess now would be a good moment to remind everyone that though I am the engineer of the model, Jesus is the Designer. And His Designs work. Wanton Violence/Crime (W) - 10 out of 100 The most of the violence in this film was found in attacks by animals, by vampires and by werewolves, some quite vicious. Self stabbing, self gashing, head shattering and decapitation were expensive to the starting 100 points in this investigation area. Warfare killings by and of story characters took a great deal of the points. God reminds us in 1 Cor. 15:33 that the "bad company" of such evil communications as that with which this film is saturated can change our coping skills by corrupting our character. Since God warned us of this, many have echoed His Wisdom and have found His Word to be True. I have spent 15 years studying the effect of the "bad company" in much of modern entertainment and have found the overall "picture" to be bleak and dark indeed (see our R-13 publication). God further warns us of the "copycat" leading effect of such displays of evil in and as entertainment in Proverbs 16:29. God even warns us that embracing such evil even as entertainment builds contempt for righteousness. [Prov. 18:3] And God further warns us that to embrace evil even in and as entertainment encourages perpetuation of it and emboldens the creeping desensitization power of such "entertainment." [Ps. 12:8] There is more to His Word about the mesmerizing power of violence in and as entertainment ... much more. But the point is made. Impudence/Hate (I) - 30 out of 100 Bella, a 17 year old girl planning to give up her soul of "love", is noted as saying "I know what I want." This is perfect portrayal of my finding that reveals it would be unusual for even a 16 year old to be able to fully comprehend the consequences of his/her actions and choices or to be able to fully separate fantasy from reality: that such capabilities do not typically plateau until the early 20s. Noted university psychology department head, Dr. Karen Nelson and practicing counselor, Dr. Larry Gilliam agree with me. In addition to a number of snippets at parental authority [Exod. 20:12], someone spoke profanity seven times [Col. 3:8] which is quite a bit fewer than usual for most PG-13 films. However, these elements, combined with a consideration of suicide, Alice (Ashley Greene) lying to arrange for Bella and Edward to spend the weekend together alone and speaking in "code" to hide the truth from the father stole enough of the starting 100 points of this investigation area to earn the content R-equivalence in this investigation area. Sexual Immorality (S) - 16 out of 100 Even Edward was portrayed as being made uneasy by the excessive shirtlessness demonstrated in this teen flick. Edward asked Bella "Doesn't he own a shirt" about Jacob when Jacob again appears shirtless before Bella. So, even Hollywood recognizes the property of male shirtlessness. And even commercial producers recognize it -- one commercial had a shirtless husband walk in on his wife and her female guest and had the wife tell her husband to put on a shirt, that her guest would never be satisfied with another man. One of the presences which stood out was the belittlement of marriage to facilitate sexual freedom and cohabitation. God does not like that. [Hebr. 13:4, 1 Cor. 7:1-2] The film also emboldens your mid to late teen daughters to manufacture sexual independence. Bella is somewhat vociferous in "explaining" and even flaunting her sexuality before her father. Numerous times Bella is seen atop Edward or Edward is seen atop Bella though each is clothed. One time Bella tries to take off Edward's clothes and her own but Edward stops her. Edward is portrayed as of the "old school" morality regarding sexual responsibility, as if that is supposed to excuse the demonstrations of of Bella's lust for Edward or that such material is presented at all. Just because you don't see any nudity or just because the making out does not reach fruition, it is still sexual. Or at least sensual. Just because there is no nudity does not make it clean. Just because "you don't see anything" does not mean nothing is seen. [1 Ths. 4:1-5] Drugs/Alcohol (D) - 51 out of 100 Drinking, drunkenness and drunken rape. All for your 13 year old kids. Right there! On the screen! A 2002 study by the American College of Physicians (ACP) revealed that adolescent exposure to drinking in and as entertainment undeniably leads to abuse of alcohol among underage viewers. The finding entitled Relation Between Parental Restrictions on Movies and Adolescent Use of Tobacco and Alcohol reports that of 4544 youths from grades 5 through 8 of fifteen Vermont and New Hampshire middle schools (90% of the youths were under fourteen years old) only 16% were completely restricted in their entertainment diets. Within the ACP study population, the prevalence of having tried alcohol without parental knowledge was • 46% for those with no viewing restrictions • 16% for those with partial viewing restrictions • four percent for those with complete viewing restrictions. The researchers selected R-rated movies because they assumed R-rated movies typically present more drinking than movies of other classifications. This assumption is no longer true. The researchers were not aware of the matter of R-13 proven by this ministry in 2000 with which Harvard University researchers agreed four years later. The bottom line? Regardless of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) classification the focus is that the emboldening influence of adolescent exposure to drinking (and smoking) in and as entertainment is undeniable. [Eph. 5:18] Offense to God (O) - Zero out of 100 As with many movies of unholy behaviors and talk, this one violates Is. 5:20 which warns of woe for they who call evil good or good evil. Portraying the evil (vampires and werewolves, if they existed) as "good" for doing good is exactly that. Using a power that is unholy and not from God even to do good is serving the unholy whether the good are served or not. There is no such thing as a "good witch" and likewise no such thing as a "good vampire" (if there were such things). Not surprisingly, this is the content area which earned the lowest of the six investigation area scores. To enumerate each instance of violation of Scripture would make this report much too large. Please rely on the listing in the Findings/Scoring area for the representation of content applicable to this investigation area. Murder/Suicide (M) - 62 out of 100 Though there were many killings (such as of the newborns), a demonstration of the loss of a life onscreen is not incorporated into Murder/Suicide if it is because of police action, warfare or is defensive killing. However, the deaths due to, for example, the vampires killing people in the streets of Seattle certainly are incorporated here. There were at least five murders noted, probably more since much of the scenery surrounding the acts was at best blurry and rushed, making the determination that the portrayal was of a life lost most difficult. For example, when the Volturi killed the defenseless young girl newborn and when Biers killed a victim in the streets of Seattle, it was murder. But when story characters died as they tried to kill each other it was not considered murder but rather defensive killing and was incorporated into the Wanton Violence/Crime investigation area. While Jacob considered suicide in one scene, only completed suicide is incorporated into this investigation area. Attempts at and contemplation of suicide are incorporated into the Wanton Violence/Crime investigation area. SCRIPTURAL APPLICATION(S) If needed to focus or fortify, applicable text is underlined or bracketed [ ] or bold. If you wish to have full context available, the Blue Letter Bible is a convenient source. If you use the Blue Letter Bible, a new window will open. Close it to return here or use "Window" in your browser's menu bar to alternate between the CAP page and the Blue Letter Bible page. CHAPTER/VERSE ***Selected Scriptures of Armour against the influence of the entertainment industry*** As always, it is best to refer to the Findings/Scoring section -- the heart of the CAP analysis model -- for the most complete assessment possible of this movie. |
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 Wanton Violence/Crime (W) - 10 out of 100 Impudence/Hate (I) - 30 out of 100 Sexual Immorality (S) - 16 out of 100 Drugs/Alcohol (D) - 51 out of 100 Offense to God (O) - Zero out of 100 Murder/Suicide (M) - 62 out of 100 |
| There are some in the entertainment industry who maintain that 1) violent programming is harmless because no studies exist that prove a connection between violent entertainment and aggressive behavior in children, and 2) young people know that television, movies, and video games are simply fantasy. Unfortunately, they are wrong on both accounts." And "Viewing violence may lead to real life violence." I applaud these associations for fortifying 1 Cor. 15:33. Read the rest of the story. From our years of study, I contend that other aberrant behaviors, attitudes, and expressions can be inserted in place of "violence" in that statement. Our Director - Child Psychology Support, a licensed psychologist and certified school psychologist concurs. For example, "Viewing arrogance against fair authority may lead to your kids defying you in real life." Or "Viewing sex may lead to sex in real life." Likewise and especially with impudence, hate and foul language. I further contend that any positive behavior can be inserted in place of "violence" with the same chance or likelihood of being a behavior template for the observer; of being incorporated into the behavior mechanics and/or coping skills of the observer. In choosing your entertainment, please consider carefully the "rest of the story" and our findings. |
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