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| Stephenie Meyer in 2009 Photo by Tara Rebeka |
Those who see it as sheer entertainment feel that sometimes a movie is just a movie. Those who see it as a moral/religious allegory analyze author Stephenie Meyer's Mormon religion and seek hints of it throughout the saga. Those who see it as the devil's influence view focusing upon vampires as intrinsically evil.
One person uniquely suited to shed light (and/or darkness?) on this subject is Anne Rice. Rice began life as a Catholic and later began to explore different philosophical, literary and spiritual traditions. While doing so, she wrote quite a few well-known books - some of which feature vampires (i.e. Interview with the Vampire), as well as witches and other supernatural manifestations.
In 1998 Rice returned to the Catholic church. In 2002 she "consecrated her writing entirely to Christ, vowing to write for Him or about Him." However, she did not renounce her previous writings, stating, "Let me begin by saying that I see my earlier novels as part of a long tradition of 'dark fiction' which includes some of the most highly prized religious works read in Western culture." Rice went on to reference such works as Shakespeare's MacBeth, Dante's Inferno, Dickens' Christmas Carol and Goethe's Faust.
Rice then declared that her vampire novels are meant to be "transformative," explaining, "All these novels involve a strong moral compass. Evil is never glorified in these books; on the contrary, the continuing battle against evil is the subject of the work." She concluded, "Individual readers, and history, will determine whether or not I succeeded in my intention...."
Resources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twilight_(novel_series)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephenie_Meyer
http://annerice.com/Chamber-Biography.html
http://annerice.com/Bookshelf-EarlierWorks.html
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