By Peter Hyle
Recently, another one of Stephenie Meyer’s novels was transformed into a major motion picture. Leading up to the release of The Host, it received a lot of interest from fans of the author. I never planned on seeing this movie but because I did, I feel obligated to give it the review it deserves.
It is not very often that I dislike a movie, which is why this film caught me by surprise. The beginning is off-putting and confusing. I had to pick up bits of information as the story moved forward, and I think it would have been more entertaining if everything had gone in the correct sequence of events.
The movie takes place in a futuristic world where small aliens have invaded and possess human bodies. There are hardly any actual humans left, and the main character Melanie (Saorise Ronan) is one of them. When her body is taken over an alien called Wanderer (the humans call her Wanda) is left with intense and annoying symptoms of schizophrenia.
The best part about this movie was The Seeker (Diane Kruger), a possessed human who makes it her personal mission to hunt and kill Wanderer. Right when I was about to give up on this movie altogether, she would keep it afloat with her fascinating character development. The unexpected remarks from the voice inside her head prevented me from taking the dramatic scenes seriously. Not only that, but some of the scenes themselves were completely bizarre. At one point, a character simply hit the brakes, and the entire car would fly into the air and spin around like it was hit by a semi truck.
Towards the end of the movie I could definitely tell that this was based off of a Stephenie Meyer book, because it had the same conflicts as the Twilight saga. It was essentially one girl trapped between two men (Max Irons and Jake Able), and it reminded me so much of Twilight that I could hardly stand it. If you liked those movies then you will probably be amused by the unnecessary drama throughout The Host.
In all, this movie is just an attempt to milk more money out of the Twilight fans. The basic plot does have potential, and I will admit that the world this film took place in was interesting. But the good portions of this film are completely overlooked due to the ridiculous dialogue, characters, and scenes.