'New Moon' on the rise

VANCOUVER, CANADA — Robert Pattinson is having an Obi-Wan Kenobi moment. Inside a soundstage where "The Twilight Saga: New Moon" is shooting, the lanky English heartthrob stands in front of a tall, wide green screen murmuring a tender admonition, "You promised me nothing reckless." Motion capture cameras hurtle toward him across a length of track affixed to the stage floor, while a team of technicians studies his stance and the tilt of his head.

The plan is to digitally insert Pattinson, who plays swoony good guy vampire Edward Cullen, into a scene that was filmed much earlier -- one in which he appears as a spectral vision to his costar, Kristen Stewart, cautioning her headstrong character, Bella Swan, against hanging out with some unsavory-looking biker types. For the effect to work, Pattinson's image will need to be dropped in at exactly the right position, so despite the cast and crew nearing the end of a very long early May day, perfectionism is still the standard.

The team working on this sequel to last year's Catherine Hardwicke-directed "Twilight," which brought in an unexpected $365 million worldwide for Summit Entertainment, is moving quickly to sustain the momentum of the sexy, youth-oriented franchise.

Between takes, Pattinson chats with the crew while director Chris Weitz stands several feet away, his arms folded behind his head. Visual effects, "that's not my thing," he concedes with a wry smile.

What does interest him is literature. Due in theaters Nov. 20, "New Moon" will mark his third consecutive literary adaptation after having directed "About a Boy," from the Nick Hornby novel, and "The Golden Compass," the big-budget fantasy based on the first chapter in author Philip Pullman's award-winning "His Dark Materials" series. It was his experience making that film -- which should have been a dream project really, given Weitz's reverence for the source material -- that made the idea of taking the reins on the second "Twilight" film so appealing.

During post-production on "Compass," Weitz was unable to persuade New Line Cinema to allow him to move forward with the ending he'd originally planned for the $180 million film, one that was decidedly grim but faithful to Pullman's vision. The movie was released with an alternate ending that the studio felt would be more satisfying to audiences, but something about the project failed to connect; it earned only $70 million domestically, though it did fare better overseas.