Sunday, July 5, 2009

LET THE RIGHT ONE IN (2008)

[Update 03/07/2021: Need to redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

Swedish art house meets the vampire genre with good results. That is, if you don't mind the slow pacing.  If you're expecting something like THE LOST BOYS, but with snow and subtitles then you're not even going to make it through the first 30 minutes. But if you do stick around then you're in for a treat.

Oskar (or as I like to call him "the Swedish version of Danny from THE SHINING") is a twelve year boy old with some problems: he lives alone with his mother in some depressing-looking apartments, it's always snowing, he has no friends and the local school bullies are constantly kicking his ass. Then a vampire trapped in a 12-year-old's body moves in next door and they become friends.  Aww.  Oh yeah, there's also a serial killer living next door.

Based on the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist (who also wrote the screenplay), director Tomas Alfredson does a very good job of capturing the helplessness and torment Oskar is going through and his subsequent attraction to the vampire, Eli. Recommended for fans of arthouse horror.