Review of Let the Right One In (2008) by Andy B — 13 Oct 2015

Let The Right One In is a superb and stunning movie that delivers loads of thrills, tension, suspense, atmosphere and stand out performances while it also tries to balance intelligence in its impressive storyline at the same time.

Let The Right One In tells the story of a young 12 year old bullied boy name Oskar who lives in a lonely life where he gets picked on by a bunch of bullies and has problems as well surrounding his parents' divorce.

But everything in his life is about to change when he suddenly meets and befriends a beautiful yet strange 12 year old girl name Eli who lives with her guardian Hakan. Oskar soon learns that Eli is something else as he learns about her secrets as more murders start to occur where he soon learns that she is in fact a vampire but Oskar's friendship and feelings for Eli grow than his fear for her and Oskar must make a choice either to help and join Eli or avoid her at all costs.

I love this movie as much as I love reading the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist and despite several changes it still works really well. For me this is a great adaptation of Lindqvist's novel of the same name and it is also an example of how to make a good adaptation of a successful novel without mistreating the formula itself.

Not only that this film is also an example of a well told vampire story that offers something slightly different and new in the vampire genre and in my honest opinion I appreciate this film over the horrible Twilight Saga.

This is an anti Twilight movie and for those who hate Stephanie Meyer's Twilight novels then you will like this movie more and something also worth your time. What I like about Let The Right One In is how this movie deals with its basic concept in the vampire genre since vampire movies today start losing a lot of blood due to the Twilight movies horrible performance and how it treats the vampire genre.

But in Let The Right One In everything was done right from the introduction until the conclusion because this movie handles the vampire genre in a proper way by also making the concept more based on the mythology surrounding vampires like exploring their strengths and weaknesses and it is done in a proper way without insulting the formula and concept itself.

I love also the major setting of this movie and the Blackberg town itself is just as beautiful and stunning as in the novel and the snow in certain parts of the film gives it a beautiful yet eerie look because you get to see tons of shots of the glooming and snowy town with lots of people roaming around and doing their daily routines its like you're entering some sort of place that you haven't visited and you are eager to travel to that place and it fits well for the tone of the film.

The other highlights of this movie is that this film is packed with tons of scenes that are stunning, beautiful, memorable, scary, creepy and frightening as well combined with a superb eerie silence that sets the mood and dark tone of the film(The incredible sequence where Hakan drugs and hangs a boy upside down and slits his throat and grabs a lot of blood for Eli, the shocking sequence where Hakan pours acid in his face before he was discharged to the hospital, Hakan's dramatic death, the suspenceful bridge attack sequence where Jocke gets killed by Eli, Jocke's body found by a bunch of kids in the ice skating rink, the suspenceful tree attack sequence, the dramatic and yet shocking death of Hakan, Oskar splitting Conny's ear in the ice skating rink, Eli bleeding slowly from her eyes and ears, Virginia getting burned by the sunlight and the silent finale in the swimming pool where the three bullies are murdered at the hands of Eli along with the beautiful ending) plus I love the surprising character development and the introduction of the two main characters both Oskar and Eli were so likable and 100% mature at the same time.

One of the other things I like about this movie is the themes of the film. If you read the novel then you know what the themes and tones are in this movie but if you haven't yet let me tell you. I love the certain aspect and themes of this movie and the themes in this film are amazing which is about the dark side of a human being like bullying and of course issues surrounding divorce etc.

... These themes really create a dark mood and feeling for the film and these are the themes and tones that are very realistic in the concept and execution and it also creates a very dark feel this also includes first love and more and it sets the tone in a proper and darker direction.

Also while the movie is missing lots of parts and characters from the novel(Oskar's other friend Tommy, Eli drinking a few bits of Tommy's blood, Hakan coming back to life as a vampire and attempting to kill Eli) it really worked well for me a lot despite changes like Hakan a pedophile and more.

Now the acting is impressive. All of the casts did an amazing job with their performances in this movie but I truly appreciate and praise the performances of the two child actors(Kare Hedebrant and Lina Leandersson and hey Lina Leandersson is cute and gorgeous in this film) while the rest did the same thing.

Director Tomas Alfredson did an amazing job with his work on this movie and he managed to turn John Ajvide Lindqvist's screenplay into a dark, dramatic and suspenceful Horror film that combines romance elements done in a well balanced way and John Ajvidde Lindqvist's screenplay captures the breathtaking and beautiful feel of the overall movie and it gave the film a very haunting yet moody feel at the exact same time.

Overall Let The Right One In is a superb yet beautiful, stunning and breathtaking Horror film that reinvents the vampire genre in a satisfying way and it also captures the haunting feel of the novel at the same time.

This movie gets a 10.4/10.