If you haven't seen the Swedish film Let the Right One In, you should. I rented it after reading an intriguing review on an excellent blog I follow, Blood Milk, and it was stunningly lovely. 
I'll admit, I have an undeniable weakness for vampire films, but this one transcended the genre with its fragile beauty. If you can't bear plainly illustrated violence and slow, disturbing moodiness, this may not be the film for you, but I was absolutely mesmerized. 
The film does not flinch from exploring intense themes in the fertile borderlands between good and evil, adulthood and childhood, innocent friendship and budding sexuality, and all of these are treated with incredibly stark tenderness. The two twelve-year-olds who play the leads were quite magnificent in their roles, and the icy perpetual night of the slums of Stockholm was a perfect setting. The film is both savage and poignant, and utterly moving.
The film is based on a 2004 novel that I'd love to read. I'll pretend I didn't hear about the American remake. La la la.
Good trivia... besides the lore that says a vampire cannot enter a house uninvited, the title also refers to a Morrissey song I had never heard, "Let the Right One Slip In," which includes the delightful lyric "I'd say you were within your rights to bite." I've been bitten, truly.
5.04.2009
Within Your Rights to Bite...
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5 comments:
Great review. I had never heard of it before, and now I have to see it!
Ahh yesss i'm keen. Blood Milk looks like a bit of a find, too. *goes to play*
x
one of my all time favorites xx
didn't know about the morrissey song. i loved it. was fascinated that it was a very traditional stoker-esque vampire tale yet stripped of the glamour. the title was nec. to tie it all in.
i too am a big fan of vampires and this is up there with my top three vampire films of all time.
now go rent 'near dark' now!
the book somehow, was even better! i'm glad you loved it as much as i did.
xoxo
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