The Twilight Saga: New Moon has been out for a few weeks, and fans are sad. Sad because it will be another nine months at least until Eclipse is released and with it the next sighting of Edward Cullen, everyone's favourite sparkly vampire.
Luckily the wait isn't as long to see Robert Pattinson, who will be in something sooner. In this, in fact.
Some might argue that a trailer that begins with the words "Gandhi said …", but then shapes up to be about nothing more history-bothering than the angsty love story of beautiful emo youth, is probably worth dismissing at that point and exploring no further.
But no matter: those people are themselves dismissed from this week's class. For they are not the ones likely to get drawn in by the good looks of RPattz, furrowed in deep thought, as above.
Luckily, there are many others who disagree. And it's a good thing, because most of the rest of the trailer is built on other jaggedly attractive images of Robert, in various states of lonely handsomeness.
Thus, we have RPattz in pain after being beaten up in the street for no obvious reason, except for the fact he is a man who moves through a dangerous world; RPattz in the library, for he is a man of intelligence (he is a student of global politics, please note); RPattz deep in contemplation, for he is a man capable of great thoughts (and quotes Gandhi, to boot); and RPattz in love, or rather, as pictured above, in bed, probably doing things that sparkly vampires aren't allowed to do.
These are the many faces of RPattz. And there are more. In fact, you are left in no doubt who the star of this film is, why they expect people to see it, or why there will be a good deal of publicity surrounding it.
Because it's all about the Pattz. We see him, a troubled young student, intelligent yet wounded (emotionally as well as physically, it seems) moving through the world and doing things that prove he is A Man on the Edge. Things such as arguing with his rich dad. Or smoking in the reception lobby of an expensive-looking corporation (probably belonging to his dad. It's a hard life).
The smoking indoors may be the "broke the rules" part of the trailer's broken sentence. From the trailer, it appears he will break other things during this film too, including windows, teenage hearts, and straight through the boredom threshold of normal cinemagoers not likely to be satisfied simply by watching RPattz being moody and gorgeous for two hours (or more. This looks like it has the potential to be romantic, dramatic and epic).
It's not just him, of course. Man cannot act alone, even when he has just the one character to perfect (with variants: moody sparkly emo teen and moody NOT sparkly emo teen). There are clearly others in this film.
For instance: (clockwise from top left) there's Pierce Brosnan as Pattinson's dad; a young girl, cute as buttons, who plays Pattinson's younger sister (and is likely to impart wise things at unexpected, life-changing moments – she looks the type); and Chris Cooper as the father of Pattinson's love interest (and a cop/the man we saw beating up RPattz early in the trailer). The lady on the bottom left is his salvation, the lovely Emilie de Ravin from Lost. She wears a sweatshirt covered in butterflies which, with the rumours that studio executives are calling this the new Love Story, suggests that you can probably bet on at least one early death by the eventual end of this film. Butterflies and their beautiful, short lives are always a bad portent, poor lamb.
I'll give them one thing, it's certainly an informative promo – one certainly has the chance to learn a lot about why one might or might not want to watch it. Or, in other words, to simply spend a few hours sucking on popcorn and gazing on the unbesparkled face of Robert Pattinson.
Because really, that looks like the one thing this film might be offering. By quite a long distance.
Trailer wants to appeal to: People who can say "Phwoarr!" and yawn at the same time.
Clarity of trailer: 7/10
Anticipation created by trailer in the likes of me: 2/10