January 12, 2011

• Let the Right One In: Book to Movie

  I’m thinking of writing for Suite101 and hopefully earning some extra money in the process if their ads are to be believed. Below is a review that I’ve polished up. I originally sent it to someone in an email and never posted it anywhere. Since they ask for a writing sample at Suite101, I’m sending this to them and figured some readers here might appreciate it as well.

   

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  Let the Right One In was both refreshing and disappointing as a movie. From a book to movie standpoint, John Ajvide Lindqvist’s book was far superior. Considering there are only a handful of movies which have ever approached the quality of their literary counterparts, this is not much of a surprise to avid readers. However, more than a few scenes and subplots were excised from the story which would have provided us with a much edgier movie. This is not to say that the movie was bad. Certainly if I had not read the book, there would have been little to disappoint me in the movie. In fact, I own both, and though I don’t approve of American remakes of foreign movies, I look forward to buying the Americanized Let Me In which I have not yet seen and which is due out February 1st.

  Much of the vampire mythology used in Let the Right One In was created by Hollywood. The fascination with puzzles, which acted as the seed of friendship for the two main characters, was a well established vampire deterrent in European folklore. Infection by bite also follows the official lore. Contagion is a theme which has been picked over time and time again, but the unfortunate series of events which unfold around the main characters and the details of Eli‘s own infection prove that it is far from dead. Incineration by sunlight is an old Hollywood invention, and though there are variations in folklore on a vampire being able to enter a home uninvited, none of them are uniform or specific. The only instance I can think of concerning uninvited entry is the propensity for Greek vampires to call out the name of their intended victim from the street. If the person answered, then the vampire could claim them. The cat attack scene which I loved in the movie and book has no folklore equivalent, despite the fact that animals have been known to react with fear around “unnatural” things. I was particularly pleased to see Eli’s sleeping arrangements, recalling perhaps the 1987 movie, Near Dark. A vampire who could not adapt to modern inconveniences would probably not live past the first social or technological shift, though given their near universal attraction to puzzles, you might expect to find more vampire mechanics and computer hackers in this day and age.

  Though both the film and movie managed to hold on to the romanticism of vampirism as it is currently portrayed, its status as a disease was also played up. This was done adequately in the movie, but was an ongoing theme throughout Lindqvist’s book. Vampirism as a virus was a refreshing return to the folklore which portrayed vampirism as almost pandemic at the height of the scare in Eastern Europe. Immortality in vampirism is hit or miss depending upon the area, but most folklore agreed that a vampire did stop aging at death, using blood to maintain life if not youth. The only criticism I have for the book is the lack of explanation concerning Eli’s emphatic denial of being labeled a vampire. I know of living vampires, such as the moroii of Romania, but this is only because I have had a life long fascination with folklore and mythology. It would have been helpful to other readers if Lindqvist’s had expanded on this in his story.

  Oskar, despite his fascination with death and serial killers, was possibly the most sympathetic character. I can’t imagine there are many people who were not bullied in school to some extent. My personal experiences at home and school were a little closer to Oskar’s, causing more empathy with his plight than Eli’s. Both the movie and the book capitalized on the recent propensity for the escalation of school violence to good effect, though I don‘t advise letting your pet vampire fight your battles for you. Despite the inference that Oskar would grow up to replace Eli’s “guardian,” I chose to see the ending of both the book and movie as a hopeful one for the duo. In a way, Oskar represented an unspoilt Eli, a symbol of what Eli was before he was infected, which explains perhaps why Oskar had such an effect on his friend..

  In the end, Let the Right One In is excellent no matter what media you choose. While the book has some pretty obvious advantages over the movie, the casting and acting in the movie carries a great deal of weight. If viewing the original movie (not the American remake), I highly advise watching it with the subtitles rather than dubbed as I do not believe the voice actors knew English. Their English dialogue lacks the depth of emotion you will hear in the original voices. I do however recommend reading the book first in order to give context to some of the action and mentally add in the scenes from the book which were left out for time.

  • 2:42 pm
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