Katrina and I like our fantasy men Cold, Undead and Sparkly

Do I dazzle you?

Twilight fever has finally hit my home. I used to be such a snob about this series of books, even though they have made such a mark on the teen girl landscape--or maybe because of that, actually. It seemed a bit too pop-culture oriented for my taste. And also--vampires? Really! So not my style. All that changed the night my daughter brought home the DVD and I sat down to watch it with her. I finally got the point. Edward Cullen may be a vampire, but he is SMOKING CRAZY HOT! Kind of like Mr. Darcy would be if he could inhabit an undead, buff 17-year old body. What's really sexy, of course, is the intensity and singlemindedness of his passion for Bella, and his desire to know her deeply. And his constant need to restrain himself lest he devour her. And the whole breaking-all-the-rules aspect of their relationship. The adventure part of the story just adds to the spice. So ever since we've watched Bella and Edward onscreen Katrina and I have both been devouring the series with gusto.

So I'm sorry to have to say that I was somewhat disappointed in Catherine Hardwicke's Twilight Director's Notebook: The Story of How We Made the Movie. It's far too small, for one thing. It has pocket-book dimensions when the visual nature of it--largely collages of photos, storyboards and drawings, with some editorial content--calls for more generous sizing. Many of the pictures are so miniscule, my forty-something eyes struggle with the details. Also, I was hoping for something more substantive in terms of content. Lots of the notebook is concerned with how the movie's "look" was created--the character's wardrobes, the different locations scouted--but not much about things like script development, for example, or how the actors came to interpret their roles as they did. Having said that, there is some interesting material here, including some of Catherine Hardwicke's inspirational material (some stunning paintings created by Hardwicke's sister), some deconstruction of key scenes and their filming. The special effects material was fun, too. And I liked having details that had slipped by me pointed out; for example, that all of the Cullens wear a family crest in the movie, the girls as jewellery, the guys on wristbands. Didn't notice that.

Overall, though, I think the slightness of Hardwicke's Notebook makes it only for real Twilight diehards. Like me and Katrina. And a few million other girls and women out there...