Twilight: Director's Notebook by Catherine Hardwicke

Twilight: Director's Notebook by Catherine Hardwicke
March 17, 2009; Little, Brown Young Readers

Summary

A personal, behind-the-scenes look at the making of the blockbuster film Twilight from groundbreaking director Catherine Hardwicke!

This intimate full-color "notebook", designed to replicate the one director Catherine Hardwicke kept on and off the set, takes you through the creative process that went into making Stephenie Meyer's breathtaking novel come alive on screen - from casting to costumes, stunts to story boards. With never-before-seen notes, sketches, and photographs taken directly from the visionary director's personal notebook, this book includes everything from her visual inspirations, to step-by-step breakdowns of action sequences, to a behind the scenes look at some of the most pivotal moments in the creation of the film, and much more. (courtesy of Goodreads)

Review

Twilight: Director's Notebook takes us back in time - to a day when Twilight was a low-budget, quirky indie movie and the cast were young, struggling actors. It feels like a lot longer than four years (filming started four years ago; the movie was released three years ago).

Catherine Hardwicke takes us behind the scenes with her handwritten notebook full of behind the scenes photos, story board shots, and inside information. Rob and Kristen may be the stars of Twilight (Taylor isn't big until New Moon), but Catherine is the star of this book. You get the feeling that she's a mixture of laid-back cool and manic energy. She's crazy, but in a good way. I imagine that she is a lot of fun and somewhat difficult and frustrating to work for.

The Notebook starts out with Catherine's vision of Twilight and quickly moves on to location scouting in Washington and Oregon. There are numerous pages of drawings, description, and costume fittings of the characters. I loved seeing how they used the characters' clothes to enhance their personalities - like having Bella wear earth colors and gradually go from tom-boy to feminine apparel as the movie went on. She tells various tidbits about the casting, like how Peter wasn't the original actor cast for Carlisle. The pages about creating the sets were fascinating. Everything from choosing and decorating the Cullen house to Charlie's house to Arizona-ing Bella's house in Phoenix (which was really in California). You even get some idea of what they could and couldn't do within their budget.

Catherine takes you through each of the major scenes in Twilight: the van crash, the meadow, the Cullen house, the baseball games, the ballet studio, and more. There is a lot of story-board art, some of which is artful and some of which looks more functional. The pages are also filled with screen shots from the movie, behind the scenes photos, and even some pictures from rehearsals. The photos and art are all captioned with funny quips about how the scenes were shot, what the actors struggled with, or the temperamental weather. I liked reading about how difficult it was to shoot before Kristen turned 18.

At the end, there were a few pages about the editing process, the little CGI they had to do, creating the soundtrack and score, and even a little bit about the Twilight mania. There's even a grainy photo of Rob recording songs for the film (I thought Let Me Sign was so much better than Never Think and wish it wasn't a bonus track on the iTunes version). I particularly liked seeing how scenes could change from light to dark, from sunny to cloudy through editing.

If you want to be a Negative Nancy, you can tear this book apart. Catherine only published this to cash in on the Twilight payola. The so-called "Director's Notebook" is nothing like a real director's notebook would be. The "handwritten", homey feel is a fake attempt to convince readers that Catherine is your friend and that you're getting tons of insider information when really you can find most of the photos and Catherine's stories on the Internet. All of this is probably true, but I don't care. I love this book. As flawed as the first movie was, it had an edgy, low-budget feel that felt more personal than the later movies when they had big budgets and a big reputation to fill.

Rating: 5 / 5