Let the Right One In (2008)

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

This is one of the greatest vampire movies ever made. Coming from cold but cinema savvy Sweden, this original version is superior in every way to its Hollywood insult of a bastardized remake. Touching themes from inherent evil to female manipulativeness to love to illusion and eternity, this movie is a must see.

One of the most haunting films I have ever seen. I still remember the fist time I saw this. Went in knowing nothing about it and at the end I was in a daze and speechless. I laid awake in bed all night thinking about it. This is a damn near perfect horror movie. Beautiful setting, wonderful acting, brilliant story, bloody carnage.

The DVD cover states that it's 'the best vampire movie ever'. Reviewers on this board call it the best vampire movie ever. Even vampires the world over call it the best vampire movie ever.For this viewer, something got lost in translation along the way. Maybe my problem, if I have one, is that I'm way beyond the average age this picture most likely appeals to, which I presume to be a primarily teenage and young adult crowd. Even though the story isn't really hard to follow, abrupt scene changes in the picture manage to disrupt continuity, thereby presenting a choppy narrative. There are the prerequisite nods to previous vampire lore which I was thankful for, like Virginia (Ika Nord) turning into a vampire after being bitten by Eli (Lina Leandersson), and then bursting into flames in the presence of sunlight. But then there was the whole thing with the cats going all feral at one point in the presence of an infected person. What's the deal there? Never heard of that before.If you want to go head to head with the best vampire movie ever, you'll have to reach all the way back to 1922 and the original - Max Schreck's "Nosferatu". That's the one I judge all vampire flicks against and very few even come close, though Bela Lugosi's turn as "Dracula" in 1931 is pretty respectable. I know those classics don't hold the same fascination for the blood and gore fans of present day, but sometimes more scares are achieved by suggestion than seeing it splattered all over the place. That's my take at least, and I'm sticking with it.

There's plenty of other reviews that cover the basic premise of the film, so I'll just get to the point. After watching "Let the Right One In" and now rereading the same reviews that lured me to it, I'm completely befuddled. It seems as though I did not quite see the same film as everyone else. Sure, the film is in Swedish, the scenes and plot points were the same as the reviews described, but I apparently saw the film in a different light. They say it's a love story, I see a tragedy. They say the long wide-angle shots of snow were "atmospheric", where as I felt the scenes were slow, dull, empty--emblematic of so much of what is wrong with the film. Before I get into that, I would say the one thing that I truly liked about the film was Eli. Most modern films of its genre are huge overproduced blockbusters with tons of exposition, backstory, and/or gratuitous gore. Eli stands in absolute contrast. She's shy, enigmatic and, I may say, wonderfully understated. She has very few lines, so most of her story is told through her interactions with other characters and the actress' performance. Eli seems bored, trapped by her circumstances, as I suppose someone in her situation would be. Throughout the film, there are nice little hints and glimpses of her true nature before the "reveal". It shouldn't come as a surprise to those who'd been paying attention. The break from her normally shy and reserved demeanor in the reveal was a bit jarring, I give the film a point for pulling that off as well. Also, beneath her facade of shy innocence is a deceptive manipulator. There's a lot of other clues about Eli that almost no one seemed notice, but I'll get to that in a bit. In spite of her age, I feel the actress gave a solid performance that outshines even her elder castmates. Most of the film, overall, is average at best. The cinematography is "effective" at conveying the story. However, the pace of the film is glacial. While some slow-paced films take their time to build to something, this one seemed more interested in long shots establishing the "mood" than building plot or character. Much of this is to do with editing, how the film budgets its time with various elements. I wanted to know more about the characters and what was going on with them, but no...it feels like those scenes were cut short to make more time for cinematic "atmosphere" or other extraneous filler. For example, all of the scenes with Oskar's dad could just as well had been cut, as he's otherwise not part of the plot and the short phone calls with Oskar's mom said more about him and his relationships than any of his actual screen time. Hell, after all of the time spent with Oskar, the main character of the film, what can one really say about him? He's about middle-school aged, his parents are estranged and living apart, he's bullied by some of the schoolboys, he has a hobby, and a weird neighbor. A lot of his screen time is spent with all these things related to him, but the film says very little about what he thinks or feels. The rest of the performances are mostly average. Some characters were a bit understated and some were melodramatic, but a least they give some insight into their feelings and motivations. However, the lack of depth in Oskar is what really kills the film for me. He portrays very little about himself and rarely reacts to anything unless it affects him directly, in the moment. Even worse, the actor just can't act. I've seen other films with socially challenged characters that still managed to pour much more "character" into their roles. Oskar was as wooden as Pinocchio, only without any aspirations of becoming a boy. The film could have just as well had an actual block of wood stand-in while the actor read his few lines off camera without much consequence to the film. Eli's caretaker is similar to Oskar in many respects, but even he manages to portray more about himself in his few scenes than Oskar does in the entire movie. Also, the plot gives very little motivation behind Oskar. He's mostly a puppet of his circumstances, tumbling through life, lost in his own world until he meets Eli. The main character and actor are crucial to a film's success and Oskar fails to hit any mark. The only things I feel for him are boredom and pity. I pity myself more for haven't been suckered into watching the film. So, what did everyone miss? What makes this a tragedy rather than a romance? Looking at the plot from Eli's side rather than Oscars, things take on a very different perspective. (If I still, somehow, haven't dissuaded you from watching the film, I'll try to avoid any outright spoilers.) Eli's caretaker is an older man, likely in his 60s, who seems to be a little slow, dull, and socially challenged--much like Oskar. Eli's relationship with her caretaker is manipulative and abusive. By coincidence, one night she meets Oskar, who is also a social outcast. Oskar isn't put off by her peculiarities, because he's so desperate to have a friend and otherwise oblivious. Though Eli seems to develop feelings for Oskar too, she repeatedly uses and manipulates him for her own means--things she can't easily do herself. The similarities with Oskar and her caretaker, and Eli's relationships with them, don't seem to be a coincidence. None of this is explicitly said in the movie, as much is done without any real explanation, but there is a lot of subtext.