From the beginning to end, this is a fantastic film. It feels so real. The director did such a great job of creating a believable universe with flushed out characters. This is on a number of top horror movie lists including my own. I found it really intriguing and weird.
Oskar is a twelve-year old with a few issues. He isn't very popular and he doesn't have very many friends. The kids that do pay attention to him just bully him and beat him up. Except for one strange girl. Eli. It's like Ellie. They live in a big brick tenement in Stockholm, Sweden. Eli has a strange secret and it has to do with consuming blood, staying out of the sun, not eating food, and not being able to enter a room without being invited in. I am sure you can put those things together. Let's just say that she has been 12 for about 200 years.
Gripping, intriguing. I have watched it a couple of times now and enjoyed it each time. It's like a book that you can't put down. The acting is really good. Kåre Hedebrant plays Oskar and does a fantastic job. He plays a troubled child so well. Lina Leandersson brings the realistic melancholic feeling to her vampire character. It's like nothing before.
The plot is very dramatic and it doesn't eat into the horror so that's nice. This movie takes the vampire genre in another direction and it is well received. It actually makes you feel something. Watching this movie elicits an emotional response from it's viewer. It is a pretty incredible thing.
This is a highly recommended movie. It's made in Sweden and can be watched with subtitles or dubbed. I would suggest watching this with the subtitles. You may not understand exactly what the actor is saying, but you can hear their voice and it adds more to the movie. Unless your one of those types of people that has an aversion to subtitled movies. The dubbed version lacks some emotion, but either way it's great.
Director: Tomas Alfredson
Starring: Kåre Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson, Per Ragnar, and Henrik Dahl
Style: Dramatic Vampire Romance - Kids
Country: Sweden
Studio: Sandrew Metronome Distribution Sverige AB
Did ya know...
Almost every scene in the movie contains the color red or red/orange, a clear reference to the color of blood, the only food Eli can consume.Several tricks were used to create the right sound effects for some of the gorier scenes. Biting into sausages was used to replicate biting into skin and flesh, and drinking yogurt was used to sound like drinking blood. The sound of the children blinking was made by the skin of a grape rubbing against each other in an almost 'blinking' motion.Both John Ajvide Lindqvist and Tomas Alfredson admitted that they do not like or care for vampires.
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