Rating: B
Dir: Tomas Alfredson
Star: Kåre Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson, Per Ragnar, Henrik Dahl
a.k.a. Låt den rätte komma in
Still a better love story than Twilight. Then again: what isn’t? But the same year that moms were screaming about whether they were on #TeamEdward or #TeamJacob (remarkably, without being told by Chris Hansen to have a seat over there), a rather different tale of romance between a teenage vampire and human, was unfolding on the other side of the world. It was an adaptation by author John Ajvide Lindqvist of his 2004 novel of the same name. It’s set in the eighties – 1982, to be precise – though this goes considerably easier on the throwback trappings than the likes of Stranger Things. Outside of a gratuitous boom-box playing Flash in the Night by Secret Service by the swimming pool, this feels like it could take place in any era.
The central character is Oskar (Hedebrant), a 12-year-old kid who lives in an apartment block, located in a suburb of the Swedish capital city, Stockholm. His parents are divorced and he lives with his mother Yvonne, though she’s not exactly the most involved of parents. As in, I’m not sure she realizes he is her son, rather than a small, demanding house-mate who forgets to pay rent. Oskar is bullied at school, though let’s be honest, keeping scrapbooks of true crime stories clipped from newspapers will get you marked out as a weirdo, even back in the eighties. He is trying to pick up the courage to do something about it. That “something” turns out to be the arrival of new neighbour Eli (Leandersson), who moves into the apartment next door with her… guardian, Håkan (Ragnar).
It quickly becomes apparent to viewers that Eli is a vampire, who relies on Håkan to murder people and harvest their blood, bringing it back to the apartment for Eli to drink. This is clearly not a sustainably permanent lifestyle, so the pair lead a nomadic life. Also, let’s be honest, Håkan appears to be more than a bit crap at the whole “vampire familiar” thing, to the extent you wonder how they managed to survive so long. We first see him stringing up a victim in the local woods, only to be interrupted by a woman walking her dog. Considering we soon see Eli is more than capable of finding her own meals, you kinda wonder about his purpose. He ends up arrested after another botch-job, and finally serves a useful purpose. Well, his blood does, at least.
Back on the main plot, Eli and Oskar become increasingly close friends, sharing a status as outsiders, and eventually agree to go steady, even though Eli confesses, “I’m not a girl.” No you aren’t. You’re not “more or less 12” either, any more than Leonardo DiCaprio is “more or less 19.” This may have been acceptable in the eighties, but their relationship is not an element of the film which has aged well. It now feels an awkward dynamic, where Eli, two centuries old, clearly has all the power, but not the honesty to go with it. The film also has an uncomfortable number of shots of Oskar in his underwear or whatever. Maybe it has more in common with Twilight and its moms than it seemed at the time.
Eli’s predations around the apartment complex inevitably mean it can’t last, and when a local resident figures out she is behind the recent rash of deaths and enters her apartment, she kills him and decides it’s time to leave. Meanwhile. matters between Oskar and his bullies have also come to a head, leading to the film’s most memorable scene. At the school’s swimming pool, Oskar is forced to hold his breath underwater, on pain of losing an eye. Except, while he’s beneath the surface, Eli returns and cleans house. The pair then head off, Oskar having apparently become Håkan v2.0. Quite what his mother has to say about this is never made clear; probably glad to be free of that small, demanding house-mate.
The child vampire thing isn’t new, most obviously having been a part of Interview With the Vampire. However, Claudia was a supporting character here, while Eli is a co-main role. It’s a refreshing take on the vampire mythology: we also learn they’re good at Rubik cubes, and cats will attack them on sight (the latter is depicted in a sequence whose effects have not aged well either). It’s quite downbeat in its overall presentation. Being a vampire certainly isn’t fun, in the slightest. The best you can hope for is a perpetually restless existence, living in the darkness and perhaps, now and again, finding someone you can share it with for a little while. How positively Scandinavian.
This review is part of our October 2023 feature, 31 Days of Vampires.
[February 2009] Twilight, consider your emo ass royally kicked – all the way from here to Sweden, and back to the inevitable, probably entirely pointless, Hollywood remake*. The film is simple in structure and tone, and distinctly chilly in atmosphere, buried in the snowy depths of a Scandinavian winter. It doesn’t bother with much in the way of explanations. How did Eli get infected? Where did her minion come from? Are there others like her? What’s going on with Oskar’s estranged father? None of this is explored, but I can’t say it hurts the film much.
It’s more interested in the relationship between Eli and Oskar, both of them outsiders in their own ways: he’s despised by his peers for being different, she’s a predator who can only go out at night, and is resigned to a nomadic life without attachments or companionship. Somehow, their dysfunctions mesh, and the results are quite touching and thoroughly impressive, culminating in a scene at a swimming pool, of exquisitely satisfactory completeness, despite all the unexplained aspects. Despite high expectations going in, this does indeed mostly live up to the hype. B
* – I’d like to point out how correct I was here. The remake did indeed prove inevitable and entirely pointless. I haven’t bothered with the TV series.