The Role of Old Fashion Values in Twilight

From Titanic to Pretty Woman, Jerry McGuire to Sleepless in Seattle, movie patrons are in love with old-fashion love. They want to be romanced, to be wined and dined, and the evidence is in the numbers. Romance movie sales have grossed over $7 million since 1995, and Twilight has made over $150 thousand already (the-numbers.com).

Twilight is the biggest thing in teenage romance since Romeo and Juliet, and the love between its main characters is almost as doomed. He is a vampire destined to walk for all eternity in the body of a 17 year old and to fiend for blood, especially human blood. She is a junior in high school and the new girl. Clumsy, smart, and beautifully homely, her blood is especially alluring to him.. And he can't stay away.

The teenage girl in me fell in love with Edward as soon as his dark eyes met Bella's. In both the movie and in the book, Edward is more than just a first love, he is a vision of what romance use to be, and what it could still be today. He courted Bella and introduced himself to her father, he looked out for her emotional and physical wellbeing, and most of all, he was truly and irrevocably dedicated to her.

Romance between men and women has fallen to the wayside. It is now considered rude for a man to open a door for a woman, presumptuous to pick up the bill, and unfashionable to combine teenage love and family activities. And that's where a character like Edward stands out. He reminds teenage girls that it is important to put family first when he takes her to play a game of family baseball.

Okay, admittedly, his family needs to drink the blood of the living to survive, but hey, they aren't drinking human blood, right?

Combined with his decades of human observance, Edward offers Bella an old-fashioned courtship that is respectful to the woman's movement that took place during the last century. He never stifles her, he never tells her she can't (unless it means her life), and he always supports the strength in her actions. He does all of this and is still there to pick her up when she falls. Now that's my kind of vampire!

But they are doomed. The mortality that makes Bella so alluring and so fragile to Edward will be the death of their relationship. Throughout the film, Edward refuses to "change" Bella into what he calls "a monster." He will stay 17 and she will age. She will live a long and happy life with him and he will stay by her side until he watches her die an old, happy, and mortal woman.