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Get ready for lovestruck, screaming teenage girls, pale-faced heartthrobs, shirtless werewolves and everything else that comes along with the modern-day cinematic phenomenon that is “Twilight.”

“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1,” the fourth installment of the franchise, officially hit movie theaters on Friday and has already become a box office smash.

First, the most pressing question: Yes, fragile human Bella Swan and her vampire lover Edward Cullen finally have sex after being chaste in the first three films. But since Edward is the most prudish vampire that has ever existed, he insists that there will be no sex before marriage, giving director Bill Condon the opportunity to indulge in a lavish and glamorous wedding ceremony. Maybe it doesn’t compare to William and Kate’s royal wedding, but it tops Kim Kardashian’s for sure — not only because Bella’s and Edward’s marriage lasts longer than 72 days, but because there is something genuinely lovable about 18-year-old Bella as she anxiously walks down the aisle in a stunning Carolina Herrera wedding dress, clinging to the arm of her equally nervous father.

After the wedding, the couple leaves on their honeymoon to a secluded island off the shores of Rio de Janeiro. Their first night as a married couple ends with a broken bed and a bruised Bella, as Edward’s supernatural strength also shines through during the love making, and has left its marks on both the room and his wife.

The honeymoon, which began so perfectly and involves copious kissing and hugging (and did I mention all the kissing and hugging?), ends on a not so positive note, as Bella discovers that she’s pregnant.

The half-human, half-vampire growing in her belly sucks the life out of Bella from the inside, as it is too strong to be carried in a human body. Bella wants to keep the baby, but Edward, who fears he might loose Bella, tries to convince her otherwise. Even werewolf Jacob Black, or Jake, Bella’s best friend and Edward’s rival, can’t talk her out of going through with the pregnancy.

For the rest of the film, we see Bella getting weaker, mostly lying on the couch and drinking blood to feed her baby, while Edward is doing what he does best: Sulking and brooding, and looking up images of monster children on Google.

In the meantime, Jake is trying to fend off the other werewolves in his pack to protect Bella whom he still loves, of course. On that note, one might add that the visualization of the werewolves was somewhat disappointing. In this day and age, one would have expected better looking special effects when it comes to depicting the snarling, threatening creatures.

Toward the movie’s end, Bella gives birth in what might be the most gruesome scene in the Twilight installments yet, quickly followed by the most disconcerting story line of the whole series: Jake “imprints” on Bella’s and Edward’s daughter, which basically means that he is her soulmate and bound to her for life. Forgive me, but seeing a 17-year-old “imprint” on a newborn baby borders a tad too close to pedophilia.

While the film stays faithful to the book, one major component is missing: Even though Bella wants to become a vampire in order to spend all eternity with Edward (put on hold temporarily thanks to her pregnancy), she still struggles to leave behind her human life, which is only, well ... human. But the film only touches lightly on this struggle, which would have offered Kristen Stewart the chance to show off some of her acting skills. Instead, she is only allowed one facial expression throughout most of the film. The same goes for Robert Pattinson, who yet has to prove that he is a capable actor. The rest of the cast is not really important, but that was true for the other films as well.

Most of the time, “Breaking Dawn” follows a very slow pace, and worse, the dialogue seems stiff and clumsy.

Those who haven’t read the books or seen the first three parts need not bother going to the cinema, because they a) won’t understand what the hell is going on and consequently b) will probably find themselves smothering a yawn or two during the 117 minutes of vampire drama.

Dividing the last book into two movies worked well with Harry Potter, but doesn’t quite do the trick here. At the same time, it still gives Condon the chance to correct his most fatal error in the first part of “Breaking Dawn”: Jake only had one scene in which he runs around shirtless in the pouring rain — and this actually happened in the first three minutes of the movie. During the rest of the film, he wears a T-shirt. What a scandal!