User blog:Marisa Cullen/ON THE PROWL : WHY WOMEN ARE THE REAL AUDIENCE FOR TWILIGHT



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"Driving with Vampires was an article published, and after that all overs were scores emails insisting that the author of the article  missed the real point of the films. And what would that real point be? That Twilight isn't aimed at just teenage girls like my daughter, Kerry--it's aimed at their mothers.

They watched in delight as Kristen Stewart (playing Bella Swan) panted her way through a love triangle that included an amazingly buff and bare-chested wolf-boy, Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner), and the amazingly pale and pouty vampire, Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson).

The story was kind of a sociological learning experience. What would cause grown women to throw their panties at 18-year-old boys, as Lautner had reported to David Letterman? But being in that movie theater as women (several related to me) screamed with ecstasy when Lautner disrobed would send anyone who wasnt into the flick as much into some kind of septic shock-induced blackout, one that that would prevent you from recalling the experience when sitting down trying to even think about Eclipse

♦♦♦ There were tones of emails but heres one in reply to the author who wrote "Driving with Vampires," clarifying the appeal of the boys in the film to mature women, not just teenaged girls. It's written by Sarah Fleckner, a happily married mother and former attorney:

Oh, to be 16 again. I am old and jaded... It is so nice of you, Tom, to ask your daughter what she thought of Eclipse, but if you had asked a married woman--say, me for example--you would have gotten completely different answers.

(1) I think a huge draw is that Edward is a romantic and he is chivalrous, which is almost nonexistent these days. I am all for women's rights and equality, but I think with them, a good deal of chivalry went down the drain. (I am not blaming men for it; I think Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem would probably have been appalled by a man opening the door for them when they were perfectly capable of doing it for themselves, thank you very much, and so it went by the wayside.)

Since the women's rights movement, how many men (aside from my wonderful husband Jamie) pull out a woman's chair, stand up when she leaves the table and when she comes back, or gives her his jacket because she is cold--even if he is cold too? Edward would put his body [in front of a speeding] car for Bella. He would throw himself onto a werewolf or vampire for her. He would turn himself in to the Volturi and cease to exist.

And, while it is a bit strange that he watches her sleep--and in a normal situation that would be completely stalking, trespassing, breaking and entering, a whole host of other things, and she would definitely get a restraining order against him--in this story, he does it to protect and watch over her. I think all of those are things that women find so attractive.

(2) I think there is also a huge tension for Edward in that he so clearly has the upper hand in the relationship but doesn't want it to be that way. He doesn't want them to be an item because he knows it puts her at risk and it can't last. He keeps abandoning her because he knows the relationship is wrong, sort of like Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, but on a supernatural level.

I don't think that Edward enjoys having powers that Bella doesn't have; I think that is a huge reason why he doesn't want to be intimate with her. And in response to the question, then why doesn't he make her into a vampire so they can be equals, I would say it's because he doesn't want to take away her humanity, her soul, her ability to grow old and bear children. Which again goes back to my chivalry argument. Edward is one sexy beast, because he is so chivalrous.

So there it is, guys: Men, even those who come in vampire and werewolf varieties, should protect their women. Violence, it seems, is quite acceptable--in fact, a turn-on--if it's done in the name of chivalry.