Sunday, April 19, 2009

Let The Right One In (Låt den rätte komma in)

Set in Stockholm in 1981, Let The Right One In tells the story of Oskar, a lonely 12-year old boy suffering at the hands of a group of school bullies. When a mysterious girl of his age moves in to the apartment next door, he almost immediately falls in love with her. The only problem is, this particular girl happens to be a vampire who is leaving a trail of bloody corpses around town...

I should probably preface this review by pointing out that horror isn't exactly my favourite film genre and I tend to find vampire films especially tiresome. Nevertheless, Let The Right One In has such an abundance of 5-star reviews and proclamations of "Film Of The Year" that I was sufficiently intrigued. Sadly, it would seem that the film has become a victim of its own hype. I never felt particularly compelled by the story, although I did appreciate the slightly different approach of the vampire in fact being a lonely little girl. At no point did I consider the movie to be even remotely scary or disturbing, and to be honest it wasn't even creepy (well, perhaps the little blond kid playing Oskar...). Even the much-discussed finale of the film was underwhelming - technically impressive and intriguingly shot, perhaps, but in all honestly I actually found it vaguely amusing, which I'm sure wasn't the filmmakers' intention. 

Casting my eye over the numerous critical raves for the film, I can't help but wonder what I missed here. My suspicion is that these reviews were all written with no preconceptions of the film's quality, and as such it turned out to be a genuine surprise to most critics. Unfortunately, so many months later I can't help but the feel that the weight of expectation is now too much for Let The Right One In to bear.

VERDICT: For what it is it's quite good, but ultimately it fails to live up to the critical hype.

No comments:

Post a Comment