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Nov 8, 2010

Let Me In? No, let me OUT!

There are probably going to be a number of people that won't agree with me on this one. I know this for a fact because the two people I watched this film with kind of think I'm nuts. The reason is because I really didn't enjoy this film.

I can't blame my dislike of Let Me In on being a fan of the original or anything like that. What did it for me is the sheer amount of BOREDOM I had to deal with for the first 2/3s of the film. The story was not enthralling, the pacing was slow and I don't think there was actually anything scary about it. For a film that was being advertised as 'the scariest ever!', it actually almost put me to sleep. The last part was decidedly more interesting but still not to the extent that I would choose to watch it again, let alone buy a copy.

Chloe Moretz plays Abby, a little girl with a secret. I'm sure I'm not spoiling anybody by saying that secret is that she is a bloody thirsty vampire. Chloe does a fantastic job in the role, especially given the general lackadaisical tone of the film, and she truly was the one bright spot. This didn't surprise me and I find myself looking forward to her future work. Kodi Smit-McPhee plays Owen, a young boy living with his recently separated mother in the early 1980's. Owen is a bit of an oddball and gets quite heavily picked on and beat-up at school. The film does manage to show a very clear and real look of what it is like for a kid like that in school but I was never able to feel a huge amount of sympathy for the kid like I should have. He's really quite creepy, somewhat antisocial and seems incredibly dense. I'm going to assume that was what the character was supposed to be like and not what the child actor himself is really like. It's hard to give him the benefit of the doubt, though, since the last film I saw him in, The Road with Viggo Mortensen, was another one where I really didn't like his character. Kind of wanted to shoot the kid myself by the end of THAT film.

There are a couple of somewhat bloody attacks in the film and they could be scary to someone...I'm just not sure who. The digitally animated movements of Abby's more feral vampire side looked more ridiculous than terrifying and the effects themselves were quite under par. It all boiled down to me being quite glad when the film was finally done so I could go on with my life and forget the time I had just wasted. Had I been alone, I would have left long before the movie finished...somewhere around the time I was trying not to doze off in my seat.

One truly good thing I can say about the film is that all the teens and tweenies that are currently going crazy over how romantic and amazing vampires are, they should watch this film. It would give them a somewhat more realistic look at vampires and make them realize they don't REALLY want some creepy pale dude stalking them and hanging around outside their bedroom windows.