My Brechtal Exam

In the fourth year of my supremely useful liberal arts education, a professor opened her lecture on Bertolt Brecht by saying that, after she finished speaking, we would be fully equipped to use the phrase "Brechtian theatre" at cocktail parties. This was bleak, as I had never been invited to a cocktail party. I spent the lecture doodling in despair.

Then I saw The Twilight Saga: Eclipse!!! I realized that the painful feeling in my chest as I watched it was, in fact, Brechtian detachment! I realized, indeed, that The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is fine Brechtian theatre...right??!??

Here is a boring and detailed description of what Brechtian theatre is, but in essence, Bertolt was all about the audience never being able to "get into" the fantasy of the play/film, so as to keep a critical distance from it. (Bertolt actually had nothing to do with this since he stole the idea from his girlfriend -- SURPRISE!) "He" suggested several ways to achieve this:

1. Whenever the audience is in danger of getting sucked into the storyline, you snap! them out of it.

This is sooo Eclipse. Just as I was getting into the PSA about domestic violence that was any discussion between Bella and Edward, the camera would SNAP! to this:



Then, just as I was holding my breath about who Bella would choose as her forever lover, SNAP! Kristen Stewart would forget her line!

I know -- you're thinking, "Wow, I can't focus on this storyline at all! Damn you, Bertolt Brecht!"

2. Distance between the audience and performance can also be maintained by avoiding "good" or "bad" characters who a viewer is supposed to root for, identify with, or despise.

The director really went to town with this one. We are given three choices:

BELLA:



Bella might as well have been represented by a stringy-haired Muppet whose mouth couldn't close.



Stephanie Meyer cleverly makes her unrelatable by having her cream her pants over Edward's promise that he will woo her like it was done "in his time," i.e. back when women were property.

EDWARD:



Whose "smile" makes it impossible to tell whether he is pleased or has shat himself.

JACOB:



The most redeeming character in the movie still proves he isn't that great by having a crush on Bella, being into non-consensual kissing, and transforming into a badly animated wolf.


Am I right or am I right? How much would Brecht love Eclipse? Right?