Movie Review: Let the Right One In (2008)

I haven't seen Twilight yet because I've been waiting for Let the Right One In and I didn't even know it. What every other vampire movie has lacked over the past decade, Let the Right One In completes. This movie is a delicate balance between the cold hard reality of the living and the colder, harder reality of being a vampire. Somewhere in between all that is the spirit of friendship and the impulse to defend the ones we love.

I haven't felt this way about a vampire movie since the cult classic Near Dark.

Let the Right One In is about a girl and her keeper who move next door to a boy named Oskar and his mother. The girl's name is Eli, and it turns out she is a vampire.

Eli is a bit of Claudia from Interview with the Vampire and Miette from The Lost City of Children, only our poor Eli (played brilliantly by Lina Leandersson) is far more animal than one could ever imagine. Destitute and having almost forgotten what it is to be human, she manages to befriend the androgynous young boy Oskar. At first the two share nightly meetings by the jungle gym, but as Oskar slowly discovers her secret, the two move closer toward a relationship that is destined to last an eternity.

After her keeper is discovered-too bad Eli must destroy him too-Eli decides that she must flee the town that now is littered with those that have died to feed her. But try as she might the little piece of her that is still human longs for the friendship of her Oskar.

Will she return in the end?

Even with the English overdubs-sometimes I'd rather read the sub-titles than listen to monotone voice overs-the movie remains unspoiled. This film is beautifully captured in the dead of winter in some European town-it hardly matters you are so caught up in the film-where Eli does not feel the cold and where foreboding is like a blanket on the screen.

The spatters of blood on Eli's face are both elegant and brutal, a simple touch that is more moving than buckets of gore thrown against the wall. Oskar's growing playfulness about Eli's situation is touching and dangerous. You never quite know what is going to happen next and that is refreshing.

Ever wonder what happens to a vampire if they enter your house uninvited? I do! And let me say it was one of the coolest scenes in vampire movie history.

If you like vampire movies, then you need to see this one as soon as you can.

p.s. There's going to be an English remake due out in 2010.

I give this movie an 8.3 out of 10.