Let The Right One In, apart from being all those things you said, also used Stockholm so profoundly - that sense of sparkling, utter cold weighing on the landscape, seeping into your bones, is exactly how the film made you feel. Beautiful. I loved it. Just bought the book too!

I see that Let The Right One In is being remade by the Cloverfield director Matt Reeves (is this a good thing or a bad thing?) for the reformed Hammer Studios (ditto?).

I'm looking forward to Let The Right One In, the only thing I don't like is how foreign films are marketed. Considering so many members of the public seem to have a problem with subtitles, there can only be disappointment when this hits theatres.

I saw Let the right one in last week and was totally riveted. what i liked about it was this: it's about kids, but it's a grown up film; it's about violence, but it's not gory; and every shot looks beautiful. I don't think it's as accomplished as Pan's Labyrinth though

Dr K - Missed the discussion on walking out of movies but I came very close during Eric Steel's documentary "The Bridge". Watching the moving yet strangely sterile footage of these poor souls leaping to their deaths I was mesmerised whilst simultaneously disgusted in myself for partaking such voyeurism. A truly haunting film, its the only time I've been angry at my own reaction to a movie rather than the film-maker's work.

I see that Let The Right One In is being remade by the Cloverfield director Matt Reeves (is this a good thing or a bad thing?





---------------





Badddddd

Not as accomplished as Pan's Labyrinth perhaps, but in many ways I think it is better. And which one do I love most, and am more eager to see again? Let The Right One In - my favourite film of this decade.

Am I the only one to have almost left because of the unbearable dread before a scene towards the end of the film?



And I say that in absolutely the best way.



The two kids were terrific.

Absolutely right about LTROI's sadness - I can't remember having such a profound feeling melancholy whilst watching a film for some time, yet I came bounding out of the cinema afterwards. What a wonderful film.



Not, though, this years Pan's Labyrinth - I fear that despite word-of-mouth buzz and broadsheet critical praise that its leisurely pacing will consign it to being a mere arthouse hit rather than see it filter into the mainstream consciousness. I really hope to be proved wrong, though. Perhaps a good testing ground to see if PL did manage to have a long-term effect on mainstream audiences' appetite for quality foreign-language 'horror' (i use this in the broadest sense) cinema.



On a Swedish note, i'm sure Dr K would join me in wishing Max Von Sydow a happy 80th birthday.. Grattis på födelsdagen!!

Here are some more films to 'look forward too', as Hollywood’s remake machine is going into overdrive. Updates in development: “The Karate Kid,” “Romancing the Stone,” “Footloose,” “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” “Dune,” “Red Dawn,” “RoboCop,” “The Big Chill,” “Arthur,” “Ghostbusters,” “The NeverEnding Story,” “Total Recall,” “Lara Croft” and “Men in Black



i wish i was kidding...

Dear Dr. Mark,



I think that all of me says that Let The Right One In is "this years Pan's Labyrinth". This is a film that has feeling (a cliché, I know) and unlike all the Saws in the world, you care for these characters.



I think both Pan's Labyrinth and Let The Right One In combine vulnerable emotions with horrific, if sometimes heartbreaking circumstances. This is not just with Pan's Labyrinth, this is also with The Devil's Backbone, Cronos and The Orphanage. They are alluring and I think that Let The Right One In is a film you feel happy to wait for.

I wonder if I’m doing Let The Right One In a disservice by describing it to people who haven’t heard of it as Twilight if it were written by someone who can actually write

Can't wait to see In Loop - am a massive fan of Peter Capaldi / Malcolm Tucker's swearing - best quote ever (to the dithering Ollie) "Come the **** in or **** the **** off!". Also will go and see Let the Right One In - Stockholm is beautiul - but totally grim in the driving sleet and 3 mins daylight of November!! (have purposefully avoided listening to any more than the intro to your review Mark - am going with an open mind.)

I'd like to echo the previous comments about 'Let the Right One In'.



Haunting is definately the right word. The images stay with you long after you leave the theatre, both beautiful and terrible. The kids were wonderful particularly the girl who seemed to be able to look vulnerable and menacing at the same time.



I can't see a mainstream remake replicating this story without gutting the central relationship between the 12 year olds. Their will be many people uncomfortable about the way these children are portrayed.



The only mistep for me was the scene with the cats. Am I the only one who actually found this a bit funny?



Can't recommend this film highly enough to those who haven't seen it yet.

i know a lot of people are a bit snobbish about horror/horror-type films but at the same time i think YOU are too quick to lord over some.



example:



'let the right one in' is pretty good if not just plain good. HOWEVER it is also an example of a film which should loose 20 minutes and add an exploding helicopter if ever i saw one. well maybe not the helicopter.

Wonderful film (and adapted from a great book too!).



Also am I the only one to think that the music was absolutely beautiful?

DarthPunk - comparing LTROI to Twilight is like comparing Poe to Goosebumps.



olisomenzi - I loved the score as well. It's on iTunes for £7.99, bought it recently and have listened to the end credits suite in particular several times since.

Saw both of these in the last two days, and totally agree with Mark about LTROI.



But In The Loop is quite another matter. I don't remember being so disappointed by a "comedy" since the godawful Match Point. There wasn't much wrong with the performances - especially Tom Hollander's; though, considering it's supposed to be such a sophisticated and acutely observed piece, his "gaffes" were completely implausible (despite what is claimed in some quarters, Armando Iannucci seems to have a tin ear for the way politicians actually speak, and mis-speak). And there was material in there for a few sketches, at most, but it's NOT a feature film. Iannucci seems to have noted the success of The Office, and then just aped its surface style without grasping that what made it work - what made it funny - was that you came to care even about the monstrous characters. Is there a single moment in the whole of this film where you really give a s**t about a character's predicament? I think not. We don't care about the characters; and neither, in truth, does Iannucci. (Inconveniently, I think it was really only Chris Langham's character in the sitcom who evinced any human sympathy.)



The only thing that held my attention was waiting for the next volley of baroque invective from Peter Capaldi. But is that really anything more than a mediocre drinking game? ("I'll pull your liver out through your ****ing nostrils / glue your ****ing eyelids to the ceiling fan / wear your scrotum as a ****ing bonnet, and tie your b***ocks under my ****ing chin... " I mean, who is there that can't riff like that all evening!) The supposedly satirical dimension is that Malcolm Tucker is calling all the shots at Number 10, but that was plainly not true of the Blair/Campbell relationship - it seems to be simply an error repeated from the increasingly forlorn work of Rory Bremner. So where's the sting? We don't see Tucker following through on any of these threats, so why are we supposed to believe that they would inspire such terror?



I detest the not-so-new managerialist political establishment epitomised by both New Labour and the Cameroons every bit as much as Iannucci does, but if this stuff is as much as they have to fear by way of a cultural assault, then they really can rest peacefully in their beds: the enemy is disorientated and overconfident.



(Apologies for the asterisks, but this website seems very timorous in these post-Brand/Ross days - it wouldn't even let me add the "f" to the "***ing"!)

Dear Mark,



The answer to your holidaying dilemma is simple. Don't go on holiday. As far as I can see, it's cruel on your fans and according to you it's cruel on yourself.



Yours sincerely,

Jack

But, if Mark K doesn't go on holiday, all we'll end up with are pish movies.



Saw LTROI at an independent cinema in Birmingham a week ago tonight, and thought it was simply stunning.



Mark A.

saw LTROI last night. i have spent all day thinking about the many layers of meaning and metaphor. so much ambiguity.



according to wikipedia, the remake is an alternative adaption of the book, not a remake of the film. i assume this means a new screenplay is being written. Mark or someone else may be able to confirm.

the wiki entry for the film describes the differences between the novel and the movie. i hear the onion's AV Club has an interesting review of the differences too.



this is the film to beat for me so far this year.

*highly* recommended. the after feeling is not of a horror story at all.

Mr K

Saw you on your last holiday, stepping up on to the Cobb just as we were coming down off it. (Our son had the same coat as your son which made my missis inordinately pleased). Had to resist the impulse to start yapping at you about movies. Anyway, saw LTROI last night. Some buffoon at the end said to his partner "How naff was that, next time I choose the movie." Can't have been the same marvellous, chilling, moving, grim and achingly sad film that I sat through. In fact, I may have to go see it again tonight. Regards.

Recently watched Let The Right On In, I loved it and was surprised at how good it was.

Lovely film, very sad and heart warming at the same time. Definately one of the best foreign films I've seen this year.

Mark Kemode's review of Let The Right One In, is really really up there with many other masterful reviews about this film. Really helps put into words all those forcefully compelling & myriad feelings & amazing haunting this movie evokes - Sukdev Sandhu, The Scotsman, InTheNew.co.uk are all topreviews, not to mention many reviews here too.

No big surprise, remake in the pipeline

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1228987/

Let The Right One In is being shown by my local film society in Crystal Palace as a Halloween special on Thursday 29 October. Here's the link to their website - www.crystalpalacepictures.com

I don't really watch a lot of films. I certainly don't watch a lot of horrors/thrillers/vampire films. But when I heard Mark on the radio rave about this film, I decided I had to get down to The Picturehouse in Exeter, my local art house cinema and give this film a go. Mark is totally right in everything he says about this superb film. I have come away not only loving it and putting it into my top 5 best films ever, but telling everyone I could that it was well worth seeing. I have now bought the DVD. I am saving it, to savour it, like a fine wine.

Mark. You are always right.

A friend recently recommended this movie to me and having heard Mark speaking so highly of it I thought I'd give it a go....what a good decision. I loved everything about this movie. Camera work stunning, music beautiful, childrens performances riveting, story line completely engrosing. The atmosphere created by the cold, bleak snowy surroundings lent itself superbly to the story and the researchers of the locations deserve great credit. This film, as Mark says, is so much more than a 'vampire' flick...disturbing at times and made to make you feel uneasy and reflective, the sort of film that stays with you long after the end.

Hollywood could never have made a film like this, it would have (and may still do) been another 'Salem's Lot'...just another vampire flick.

Definitely up there with anything I've seen and enjoyed in ages.

FINALLY got around to watching LTROI, and I must confess it is one of the most amazing films I've seen in a long while. I don't know what made me do it, but I listened to it through headphones, and WOW! It has the most amazing sound engineering and score... Unlike so many films these days, there is an appreciation that less is more, and the parse sound mingles with the cold, crisp visuals in a way that is truly beautiful. I loved Pan's Labyrinth, but I think this may be even better...but hey, why choose? Let's just revel in the fact that they exist at all!