"Let The Right One In" - A review

Hello there.
As many of you now know, we will soon be releasing a little EP on Swedish record label "Substream" -  not to be refered to as Substream Records by the way, as I recently found out! So while we're thinking about Sweden, I thought I'd recommend a rather fantastic new film from that northern land. We haven't had a film review on the blog for a while, so why not indeed, I hear you cry.......

(I've borrowed the first two paragraphs from the Guardian review - My fingers are tired, look you!)

"Let The Right One In" - A film by Tomas Alfredson and John Ajvide Lindqvist

The time is the winter of 1982, with snow thick on the ground and the Cold War back in the news as tensions grow between Sweden and the USSR over Russian subs in Swedish waters. Also in the news are some puzzling murders in the Stockholm suburbs.

The film's 12-year-old hero, the sweet-natured, fair-haired Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant), a shy, studious boy living with his divorced mother in a three-storey apartment block, is being bullied at school and his tormentors draw blood. One night, while he's stabbing a tree with a knife, pretending to avenge himself on the bullies, a girl his own age appears in the snow-covered playground. She's pretty, barefoot, moves with a nimble grace, has a pale complexion with dark rings under her eyes and turns out to be a dab hand at Rubik's Cube, a favourite toy of the early 1980s. She's called Eli (Lina Leandersson), has recently moved in next door to Oskar, and lives with Håkan, a middle-aged man she calls her father. She only comes out after dark, when the school day ends and is, of course, a classical vampire.

This is wonderful, deeply affecting film, in turns a romance, a gothic horror and a european arthouse production. Stillness and whiteness dominate. There are many moments of brooding, quiet menance, some deeply black comedy, and a tender lovestory that only fleetingly becomes sexual and has at his heart the meeting of two apparently "lost" souls. Oskar is a strange, unearthly kid, blond, smooth and white, androgynous, almost bloodless you might say, and Eli, who has good reason to be physically cold to the touch as she is technically dead, seems to be a natural partner. She advises Oskar to fight back against his schoolyard tormentors, so Oskar starts to lift weights and does aqua-aeobics. He also learns morse code to communicate with Eli during the night, tapping on his bedroom wall while tucked up in bed. (...a wonderful conceit that pays dividends at the conclusion of the film)

Let The Right One In has been adapted by John Ajvide Lindqvist from his own novel. Its name comes from a song by Morrissey (“Let the right one slip in/ And when at last it does/ I’d say you were within your rights to bite/ The right one and say,/ What kept you so long?”). Fittingly so, for the former Smiths front man has long been a friend indeed for these who feel lonely, tentative and in need. .

For all its quiet moments, the film is not without its shocks. The gore, when it arrives, is delivered with mocking black humour, often just out of shot, or suggested by a bloodied arm or leaking vein. Even so, I'll never look at cats in the same way again! And a wonderful moment when hapless serial killer Håkan, who kills to feed his "daughter" (lover??), in interrupted by a visiting poodle.....

Some of Oskar and Eli’s exchanges will break your heart: “Will you be my girlfriend?” “Oskar, I’m not a girl,” she replies. On another occasion, Oskar asks her: “Are you old?” She answers: “I’m twelve. But I’ve been twelve for a long time.”  But the real heartbreak comes at the films climax, which superficially is a classically happy ending until you start wondering what Eli's real motives are for befriending Oskar. (I'm not giving anything away there)

I'm saddened to learn that an American remake is already in pre-production.... can't they make do with that toss that was "Twilight".... oh well. I can only demand that you see the Swedish original of this movie as it is amazing.....

Ben