Best movie scene of the year

Salon.com picks its top movie scenes of the year. Let Me In, the English remake of Let The Right One In, wins top spot. Its chosen scene, a botched murder attempt by the young vampire's protector, combines the Swedish original's muted efficiency with slick Hollywood tension-building tricks.

Shot for shot, beat for beat, it's the scene of the year, laying a foundation of succinct but meaningful shots and then building a madhouse on top of it. The pièce de résistance -- you'll know it when you see it -- is one of the great recent examples of show-off filmmaking in service of story. The universe has been turned upside-down.

It's a shame the new version of this movie -- hailed as a rare example of a remake as good as its inspiration -- didn't do so well in the box office. Let Me In [Salon]

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mja

I did not read the book, but it was my assumption that the caretaker in “Let the Right One In,” was the adult and future version of Oskar, not Eli’s dad. This makes the scenes where the caretaker disfigures himself and is killed by Eli all the more powerful: it’s clear that one day Oskar will suffer a similar fate.

What makes the film even more fantastic is that Oskar chooses this fate consciously, as he binds himself to Eli step by step and she entices him by murdering his tormentors. It’s a horrible bargain, made by the loneliness, rage and frustration of a child and the evil of a soul-less thing. The caretaker, a grown man, seemed more weary than anything. Had he the opportunity to go back and choose differently, I feel certain he would. But bound he was, by his own hand. I imagine a grown up Oskar feeling the same weariness and ties to her, a horrible mix of the blood on his hands and the guilt at what he has allowed her to do for him.

If there’s any pedophilia at work here, it’s that of an ancient supernatural creature grooming a pre-pubescent boy. My second thought was that the film is more generally about the horrid ways that we sometimes consume each other. I cannot imagine the American remake coming even close to the original.
Anonymous

umm, he isn’t her dad. he’s another “lover” that she picked up when he was a kid. the movie shows that she is really really old and doesn’t age. this is how she survives thru the centuries, picking up a new protector . when the current kid is old and dies (maybe old age) she will pick up another. its happy/sad moment when the kid joins the girl because it shows he now has a meaning in life now but also fell from a trap she manipulated. also its a study in a symbiotic type relationship between two species, one of which is human.

I don’t know if the USA version made the old man her dad.
Anonymous

amazing. he’s come a long way http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114781/
aninsomniac

There are a couple of significant differences between the english and swedish version and it was one of these that had made me not watch this movie.

SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
1. Eli is a castrated boy in the book and the swedish movie. This was completely changed in the English version (it’s a girl and there is no gender obfuscation) to make the movie more palatable for the mainstream-horror-fans, I am assuming.

2. Oskar was different from the caretaker. Eli is supposed to have found a kindred soul in the pyromaniac-sociopathic Oskar. I am pretty sure there is an interview of the author where he stresses that Oskar does not take the place of the caretaker.
- mja
  
  Well if that (2) is true, I don’t even like the original half so much. Then it becomes just another romance.
  - aninsomniac
    
    I think it was about the very human need to find companionship. You have an ancient child-vampire frozen in bodily pre-pubescence, but denied gender and sexuality, dependent on a pedophilic caretaker. And you have a violent, introverted and alienated boy stuck in an isolating world of a latch-key kids. I’m not sure if I would call it a romance. But even if it is, I’m saddened that a romance is considered to be such a low genre that it becomes unlikable. Poor Shakespeare.
    - mja
      
      Romances are boring, whether they are between star crossed lovers, a pedophile and sexless vampire child or whomever. We’ve been writing about them since we started writing and have rather worn out the genre.
      
      It’s banal evil that’s interesting, oddly enough. The need for human companionship is a powerful motivation in such evil. I thought it was what motivated Oskar to bind himself to Eli. I would say that Eli doesn’t need a companion as much as she needs a willing instrument (she does eat people, after all). The author may have described her relationship with Oskar as her finding a soul mate, but isn’t that the same sort of black and white, hyperbolic language that psychotics use to describe those they favor (or find useful) at the moment? And Oskar is taken in by the favoritism and the power-by-association because he is frustrated and angry.
      
      Obviously the author had very specific ideas that he wanted to explore and they may differ from what I supposed when I saw the film. I don’t have to like them though, much less find them interesting. That said, boring does not equal “low.” I’d reserve that to describe something genuinely devoid of meaning.
- knoxblox
  
  Agreed on both points.
  
  I also think the original filmmakers did very well within their budget constraints and the demands of the film scripting process to streamline/eliminate minor characters without losing much of the story.
  
  That said, it still would be rather creepy to see the scenes of Eli’s flashbacks to the night of his murder, as well as Hakan’s mindless vampire in the basement. I also thoroughly enjoyed Oskar’s kinship with the older boy (can’t remember his name), who was such a pivotal influence on the story.
- grimc
  
  So that’s what that shot is about in the Swedish movie. I thought it had something to do with vampires in Swedish mythology being androgynous or something.
  - osmo
    
    Nah its just that here we don’t have the same hysteria over gender transcention and homosexuality as in the US.
    
    Also according to Ajvide-Lindqvist Oscar DO become the new caretaker. Even though that may not be the actuall plan.
    
    Also read his other books…
facetedjewel

Agree with the comments above. The caretaker is who Oskar will be in 50 years and just as disposable.

I preferred the original for the Swedish ‘flavor’ of the story. I don’t just watch a story unfold, no matter how engrossing, I’m also watching the background/backdrop. The choices the director and cinematographer made in framing the scene, the pacing, lighting and the film itself. I’m looking for and enjoying the elements that make that film unique in style.

There is no doubt that the U.S. can take any foreign film and ‘kick it up a notch’, probably several. But in the process, they seem to cook it to death. The flavor becomes something less appetizing to me – the tenderness is gone.
piminnowcheez

I still can’t figure out why this did so poorly. It really was pretty good, and as a fan of the original, I went all prepared to hate it.
- Anonymous
  
  This scene in particular was better than the original version, but overall, fans of the original would perhaps stay away because they knew what to expect. The remake was surprisingly good, but I still prefer the original myself.
  
  Word of mouth might have been to stick with the original if you hadn’t seen either film, so that might explain the low viewership.
Grognard

“Let The Right One In” is a far superior film to the American remake. It’s available via Netflix streaming too!
- theawesomerobot
  
  I have to disagree – I loved the original, but the remake keeps everything important from the original and just nails the pacing almost perfectly, which in my opinion was one of the only flaws in the original.
thekinginyellow

i refuse to watch remakes unless i’m forced to. it’s probably why i didn’t like “the ring” and i’ll probably hate the “oldboy” remake.

anyway, i never pegged the old guy as the vampire’s father. i just figured it was an older version of the boy. we’re just seeing a changing of the guards…out with the old in with the new. not her dad!
Anonymous

The Hollywood remake was awful. Gone are subtexts and subplots in favor of a film any LA film student could make. Ugh. Just watch the original. The entire film is a great scene.
3d bomb

I haven’t seen the US version yet and view the idea of a remake as a positive thing. If it stinks fans of the original can grin knowingly, if it does really well it will just promote the original.

I adored the original, especially going into it without knowing anything about it. It was just a random pick because the cover looked interesting. Rarely do I get sucked into a movie so much I forget to smoke.
jimh

I actually avoided this remake because I liked the Swedish original so much, and was sure that Hollywood would ruin it. I liked this scene though, and it had some of the original’s delicacy and understated suspense.

I take issue with the Salon added commentary- I would have like to turn that off.

*Possible spoiler from original*
Also, Salon keeps referring to the Richard Jenkins character as “Dad”. In the original, I assumed that the vampire’s caretaker was not its father. It was my take away that the caretaker was an older version of the boy, someone who had been attracted or had befriended the vampire and had grown into the protector/caretaker role. And he had aged, while the vampire had not. It had a certain symmetry that way, this cycle repeating through time. Anyone who saw the remake, was the caretaker ever referred to as “Dad” in the film?
- billster
  
  No. I saw the remake first, then watched the original. He was never called “Dad” or “Father”. I don’t want to spoil it, but I agree with your assessment. When I finished seeing the remake I thought “He’s happy now, but in fifty years he’ll be the old man – and he’ll have been unhappy for forty seven of those years”.
David Carroll

Well I intend to watch both of them, without the text from Salon. I found it a little helpful but mostly patronizing.

As for this being the #1 scene of the year, I still think the ground-breaking use of jelly the Yogi VS greedy Mayor Brown piece is tops. ;)
Rob Beschizza

The suggestion in the original (and certainly in the novel) was that the “dad” is actually a pedo who has hit the jackpot in the form of a vampire, and has only been with the child-vampire a short time.

However, the original movie was so understated that the suggestion was of a more sympathetic father character who met the vampire as a young boy and has simply aged while she remained young. So that’s what everyone seems to run with in their second-order assumptions about the story. Pathos!
InsertFingerHere

Everyone’s got their own interpretation of the scenes.

Only one guy knows for sure, so Director’s Commentary or GTFO.
Anonymous

I watched the original Swedish version before hearing about an American version in the works. I imagine a few did the same. Perhaps this is why it didn’t do well at the box office, because those of us who care about such a movie, aready saw it.

I refused to watch the remake because I felt my IQ was being assaulted by having a good movie remade for ADD prone Americans who feel reading subtitles is hard stuffz!
Now that I know the remake was as good as the original, I may watch it in the future if it pops up on netflix instant-watch.
Anonymous

They literally do not know what literally means.
bmcraec

What’s with the immediate leap onto the pedophilia witch hunt with some recent films? I watched “The Time Traveller’s Wife” a couple of nights ago, and the director laid it on pretty thick there too. Granted the situation can’t avoid it, and while it might have been handled with a bit more subtlety, the questions are begging to be raised. I haven’t read that book yet, but for the movie to be as good as it is, the book must be stupendous.

Although, to swing onto yet another tangent, “Everything is Illuminated” might be another movie where there is a shift away from the book that makes for a better, more coherent piece of art, at least from my POV.
- mausium
  
  “What’s with the immediate leap onto the pedophilia witch hunt with some recent films?”
  
  I don’t understand what the “pedophilia witch hunt” is in the original.
- Rev.Veggie.Spam
  
  I’m sure there’s many pieces of film that build nicely on the work of their film sources… it does depend on a real appreciation of the original work’s ideas and themes.
  
  For a good example of this,consider the original “Hard Core Logo” by Michael Turner (book) and Bruce MacDonald(movie): depending on your reading speed, you can actually read the book faster than it would take you to watch the movie. However, the director, writers and actors just “get” the original book’s concepts and build on it quite nicely so it never disappoints.
- Michael Smith
  
  If you like “The Time Traveller’s Wife” you should read “There Will Be Time” by Poul Anderson.
- Anonymous
  
  If you read the book, as others have said – he IS a pedophile. This is not implied in the novel, it is (quite graphically) pointed out to the reader. He lost a job over it, befriended other pedophiles, attempted (and lost his nerve) twice to purchase young male prostitutes, and refers to Eli (or whatever they call him in the new version) as his ‘beloved.’ He even attempts to rape Eli at one point, in a side-story removed from both movies.
  
  So no, it’s not a witch-hunt. He’s a pedophile, plain and simple – and his relationship with the vampire is nowhere near the same as Oskar’s. Oskar may very well become a caretaker as well, but the basis of their relationship is different than that of HÃ¥kan and Eli.
jeremyhogan

The very definition of suspense: the audience knows something that the characters need to know, but don’t. So well done. Reminds me of the final moments of “Silence of the Lambs.”
knoxblox

Pfffft! They’re never as good as the book.
Derek C. F. Pegritz

That’s not her father–it’s a childhood friend/boyfriend who’s spent the last howevermany miserable decades killing people just to feed his childhood love’s endless hunger for blood.

Very good analysis of the scene, though. Were I teaching a film class, I would definitely reference this video. In fact, I’d probably show both Cloverfield *and* Let Me In back-to-back to illustrate how a director can employ different directing styles and shot compositions to complement totally different films.
AGC

I haven’t seen either, never really heard of the movie, saw only a part of the clip attached.

It looks good, seems very well thought out; still don’t really think I’m going to watch it. The allure of movies is gone, and reflecting on how theaters are closing, I’m not alone in this sentiment.
W. James Au

“a pedo who has hit the jackpot in the form of a vampire”

Yeah, stuff like that is what makes the story so brilliant: Who else would go around bleeding innocent people to death but a sick fuck who already preys on children? But I think that’s why the US version didn’t do too well — it took all the sexy sparkly Sookie fun out of the vampire genre and treated the concept seriously.
tyger11

Best movie scene of the year? Maybe if you didn’t see “Machete” or “Scott Pilgrim vs The World”, each of which has some pretty jaw-dropping scenes.

This does look very good, though. I never got around to seeing it (though I’ve seen the original)…definitely on my to-watch list now.
Sally

I enjoyed both movies but was disappointed that the cat attack scene was left out of the American version. My husband and I played that one over and over. Drove the dog nuts.
- Jackasimov
  
  thanks for reminding me of that scene. I was going to say that the real shortcoming of the US version was the use of crappy CGI. Now I remember that the original had some too. But god I love the original so much. I think the acting and pacing were superior. And when you recreate a scene (pool scene for instance)in a remake where you copy the original, maybe not cut-for-cut but pretty close to it, you lose.
Anonymous

In reference to the Dad, remember back to her (large) collection of puzzles. As she says, “I like puzzles”. She is much older than you seem to think she is; each puzzle was a “Romeo”.
Anonymous

didnt read all teh comments.. but the man is not “dad”…

did anyone see the movie…?? i saw him..
knoxblox

I will withhold my final judgment until I see this version.

However, it’s got to be a mighty huge act of sacrilege to beat the likes of the Americanized versions of The Vanishing or La Femme Nikita.
Anonymous

While the analysis is right on the money, it should be pointed out that the “literal” point of view shot the video describes is nothing of the sort. In fact, because the father can be seen in the right side of the frame while he cases out the parking lot, the shot cannot be a “point of view shot” (because he is in the frame). A point of view shot can only contain what is seen by the observer, which is then shown in a “looking” shot. Also, a “literal” point of view could be understood as a subjective shot, when the camera sees things as if through the eyes of a character, moving as if attached to his body. The “literal” point of view the video shows is in fact an “over the shoulder shot”.
- hostile17
  
  ‘Anon’, I thought the exact same thing when they said it was his literal point of view. How on earth does someone see the back of their own head?
thatbob

Based on the movie poster and the tagline (“Innocence dies. Abby doesn’t.”) I’m not surprised this version came and went without a ripple. I’d have been willing to give a good American adaptation a chance, but that poster and tagline scream “We don’t understand anything that you liked about the original!”

But if the new version is as good as all that, then I’m sure it’ll make up its losses in the home video market. Off to see if the library has it yet…
Jonathan Badger

I think the problem with the remake that makes me not want to see it is that they set it in the US. It’s the same mistake that remakers of Japanese horror films do. Taking away the foreign setting makes them flavorless.
- Dewi Morgan
  
  To someone who’s not from the US, that setting looks exotic and alien and American. An oxymoron to you perhaps, but it does, however, mean that you get something much closer to the intent of the Swedish movie. The first movie wasn’t *meant* to be exotic, and if that was what you took away from it, then your cultural background was preventing you from getting it. The whole point of the thing was that it was so flavourless and well-known, to the intended audience. It could be their own neighbourhood. They could watch the movie without subtitles even if they didn’t speak English, and the voices could be the guy next door.
  
  To me, though, I’ve no idea why this scene was thought to be the best, or even particularly good. Heavy-handed foreshadowing, excessive pseudo-meaningful pauses and gloomy lighting. And then the overbearing music slams in through the overbearing silence. Yes, there’s a reason most directors would have got some more interesting shots in, and why having the “patience of a spider” isn’t a great thing for most directors or viewers. That way leads to diabolically stretched-out short-story-as-movies like Brokeback Mountain, There Will Be Blood, and others.
  
  But I guess this kind of thing appeals to some. Me, I couldn’t watch Hostel because by the time they got to the hostel I was writhing with agony at the achingly slow buildup.
Anonymous

That guy in the original was NOT her father.
frankieboy

I found myself wondering if the choice of the music on the car radio was a coincidence, or were we meant to think of another song by that band, “Don’t Fear the Reaper”. Or could “Burnin’ For You” be foreshadowing for a subsequent scene? (Assuming that scene is in the remake, which I did not see).
aninsomniac

Again, according to the author, Oskar does not become Hakan, but the director of the Swedish film shot the last scene such that it looked like a possibility. Here is the interview:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/38839

Go to the Q that contains: what occured to me was that this whole thing with HÃ¥kan, HÃ¥kanâ€™s background and everything, it was removed even in the first version
fubbs

I had sworn off seeing this remake the same way I do with most, especially if I enjoyed the original (and I very much did with ‘let the right one in’). But this post has changed my mind.