And with a welcome return for the first time in many many many months of nothing about the film world filling this site, we now return to our regular bile filled hatred of all those who dare to try to be more famous than James Earl Jones.

Let the Right One In

A rather odd choice given all the other films which have graced the screen since the last written cinematic onslaught. I had asked what it was, I was told it was a Swedish Vampire Horror film.

Now just read that line back to yourself.

Swedish Vampire Horror….from the same country that brought us cheap furniture that collapses owing to missing screws and former England football coach Sven Goran Erikson, who is also missing a few screws, we now get this cinematic piece which won an award or something in Scotland, though being honest, KFC wins awards in Scotland for being luxury food.

And it was showing in an arty cinema too.

Right there and then it should have been enough to put me off, as being honest you’ve all seen me and heard me talk, you know that putting me in a situation that requires a beret, gin in one hand while talking in poems about dishwashers and how this film made all human life into butterflys and….I don’t know, I lapse into a coma when confronted with the horror of people talking about sh*t no-one understands or even cares about.

Which actually means I should be in a coma when reading this crap back through to put in spelling mistakes….hmm, a paradox.

But back to the film in any case and coupled with my comrades in arms, we made for the screen to take our seats.

All was calm until the original name for the film came on the screen: Låt den rätte komma in. I have no idea why, but I felt compelled at this point to say “Achtung, ze prisoners are escaping!” which has nothing to do with anything going on, but we couldn’t stop laughing for 10 minutes afterward, which pretty much set the tone of what was to come.

So what’s it all about then eh? Well that’s the problem with all reviews, they have to give some things away in order to give the reader a clue about it so SPOILERS are seen from here on for the rest of the entry:

A young chap, Oskar Schindler living in Ikealand gets bullied a lot, and wants to do naughty things to the little effing so and so’s who are making him jolly upset, so spends quite a lot of time with knifes.

A girl and old man move into the neighbourhood, and then one night when the boy is playing with his knife, they meet. Out pops a Rubik’s cube, it gets solved and after a while the boy and girl sees each other more and more. Arrrrrr. But wait, there’s lies, treachery and deceit afoot.

You see, the old man kills people for the tomato juice in their bodies, and seems to be pretty crap at the job as he gets caught a lot by dogs, and well those pesky kids from Scooby Doo. Fails to escape, burns his face and then dies falling out of a window from lack of blood. Not very nice.

More people are bitten, Oskar knows the girls a vampire and afterwards all manners of naughty happens.

The end.

Well that’s the very very short and largely crappy version, Really But if you took away the premise of the vampire part, it was actually a tale of childhood, about growing up, quite well written and acted out. Just with bits of chewing throats here and there.

Oskar the badly stereotypical blonde boy, was well played as a boy who was innocent in oh so many ways, and didn’t know what to do about his tormentors at school in the beginning and at the end just content with all that had happened.

And there were a few times, when he was happy, trying to get fit to stop the bullies and being just a child, that I almost felt a tear come to my eye. No bull, this was heart felt stuff, and an innocence that was lost many years ago was just something I had never expected to see. I wanna be 10 again!

Eli, The girl who was the vampire, played by Lina Leandersson, you didn’t feel hate for her as she chomped down on a couple of crazy people here and there, it was something she had to do to survive. Oskar and Eli were both loners who felt good around each other and a loving relationship had started, though some loving parts like when they were in bed…..err…am I going on the sex offenders register? (again)

The old man, who cared and killed for the girl, you didn’t really understand what he was until towards the end of the film and it all made sense and left you to fill the gaps in your head, something which not that many films do these days. And the film never strayed away from the fact that people were getting killed, with the clues falling into place for one man who lost his best friend and lady to Eli.

The film was subtitled so you had to pay attention to the words at the bottom (shame there wasn’t a fella doing the funky chicken dance for the deaf people, what is it, signage, seine, something) and it was here you could see there were a few funny lines, which kept you wanting to watch more.

Now with most horror films, you’d expect 5000 gallons of blood to be sprayed everywhere and £345934 billion pounds spent on effects. Not so with this film, it wasn’t done as out and out gore, though some bits aren’t exactly suitable for the Disney Channel.

The film’s pace is rather slow, slow to the point that one of my friends got his blackberry out and started looking at naughty pictures, but it seem that the film is more real as a result. Well real, until the point with the cats. Now it appears Cats don’t like Vampires. There was a lady slowly turning into one, and then she showed up at an apartment filled with the little gits. What do you think happened?

I can do better than say it, thanks to the gift of Youtube:

Yep, we laughed too. Come on, I wanted a cat to get thrown at the window and then fall slowly down the window like in a cartoon. Best funny moment of 2009 so far for me!

But come on, and I can’t stress the following point enough:

I know it’s an arty foreign film, but really, did we have to see a 12 year old vampire girl’s rude part?The feeling we all got when that appeared was kind of like what the audience felt at the cinema in Fight Club when Brad Pitt spliced in a frame of porn into a family film, we saw it but we weren’t sure if we should cry. And being honest, it looked like the cats had got to her too if you get where this is going. Yes you can all go ahead and vomit now.

So I suppose what started out as a viewing of a “arty foreign thing” did actually become something to watch with intent. From the films poster and the description above, you’d think it was a cheesy b-movie that was made on a budget of £6 and a pot of jam, with someone vomiting on paper to make the script.

Far from it in fact, it was a film well worth watching for those precious moments and if you do pay attention, the film rewards you. A surprising choice, but on this occasion, a good one.