Movie review: 'Let the Right One In'

By Chance Dibben

Thursday, March 12, 2009

The horror of Sweden’s Let the Right One In is not contained in its brief flashes of gore, but rather in how serious it treats the vampire myth and combines the myth with an astute coming-of-age tale.

But don’t get me wrong, Let the Right One In is effectively unsettling, even perverse, in its juxtaposition of adolescence and horror-fantasy. The filmmakers draw resonate emotions from the story of a fragile 12-year-old boy named Oskar, who struggles with his own weaknesses and frustrations. Tormented by bullies at school, our introverted protagonist can only fantasize about revenge, miming it against trees in his courtyard late at night. It is in this courtyard that he meets Eli, a 12-year old girl with her own source of isolation and revulsion; she is in fact a 200-year-old vampire.

Their love develops as awkwardly as any young adult’s but each of them gains something deeply valuable through the relationship; Eli is able to reclaim some aspect of humanity and Oskar is empowered to defend himself against his tormentors.

Photographed with obsessive austerity, the film’s atmosphere of dread is soberly stated. Where most horror movies are punctuated with blood splatter or obtuse camera angles, the filmmakers of Let the Right One In never exaggerate, heighten or underline rendering the film all the more stark and creepy.

In many ways heartbreaking but overall terrifying, Let the Right One In is a penetrating horror film because of its seriousness and sensitivity.

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 4 stars

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