The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1, was released last Friday, and had the 5th highest-grossing opening weekend ever. Girls, tweens, and full-grown ladies around the world are flocking to movie theaters to see the film, but what are they taking away from it? Mild spoiler, but in the movie, leading lady Bella opts to carry her demon baby to term, risking her life in the process. Melissa Rosenberg, screenwriter for the entirety of The Twilight Saga and self-proclaimed feminist, has described Breaking Dawn by saying, “we are fighting for choice and [Bella] makes choices.” If Bella’s got so much authority, are we supposed to assume the movie is feminist?
Rosenberg commented on Bella’s choices in an interview posted on screenrant.com, saying, “I had no interest in violating Stephenie’s belief system or anyone on the other side. I feel a great responsibility that everyone should have their point-of-view. And their beliefs respected. So I really was struggling with it until I talked with my sister-in-law who’s actually a former ACLU feminist lawyer and a fan of the books. And she pointed something out to me (which is quite obvious but which I had overlooked) which is that having a child is a choice.
“It is a choice to have a child. And having not made that choice in my own life, having actually done the opposite, that had not really occurred to me…And so for me, it was that Bella chooses this. Now someone else may not perceive that, and that’s great…It’s a story about a woman who chooses to have a child. For me. That may or may not be how it is in the book. And some people will have issues with it.”
I support a woman’s right to choose, but I don’t think the mere fact that Bella opted to have the baby makes Breaking Dawn a feminist work. What do you think?
Image Source: fanpop.com
Text Source: screenrant.com
