Let the Right One In

Let the Right One In is the vampire movie Hollywood would be terrified to produce. It's a character piece that moves at a slow pace as to allow its hero and heroine to evolve naturally. It has its moments of terror, fear, blood, and gore like anything Hollywood produces, but it is also content to follow quiet and honest exchanges between preteens. One of them just happens to be a vampire.

It's hard to place a horror movie, especially a vampire movie, into the category of realism, but Let the Right One In is the closest to vampires in the real world as I can imagine. Being a vampire is not cool. None of them are proud of it. It's like a mark of shame that separates them from anyone else except for their own kind. Unlike the more recent of successful vampire franchises, these vampires don't hole up in expensive mansions or live in covens or what have you. The young vampire girl lives with an older (and increasingly less useful) vampire in a crappy apartment building. She goes out only at night and is fearful of any real connection and her need to feed on human life (and apparently vampires have an unpleasant odor).

Calling the style "realism" cannot take away from the artfulness of the film. It's cinematography, acting, and plotting are all expertly conceived and executed. It's a lovely film in the midst of the its own carnage.

What sets it apart, among other things, is the care it takes to tell the story of the friendship and young love between a 12 year boy and the vampire girl. It's adorable and frightening. The quality is in the details that could be easily missed. The young boy's nose is always running. She is always quiet and looks sad and lonely, even after ravaging passerbys. Their connection, like most first loves, is awkward. This isn't a storybook romance. And it is a strange tale. You are likely to feel uncomfortable for some if not all of its runtime. But, as a beginning horror genre fan, I was happy to tag along. Even when the film approaches its sensational extremes, I was pleased to see it end the way it did. As it stands now, it is one of my favorite films of the year.