I realise by writing a mostly-negative review that it will be voted down. Despite this I have always found that the negative reviews are the most honest and informative. If I want to know about a movie on IMDb I always read the negative reviews.
This is exactly the kind of movie that critics love - genre busting, anti-Hollywood, foreign language, low budget. It is all of these things and in truth it is a pretty good effort. But it is a very long way from being the greatest horror movie this century, as the Irish Times movie critic Donald Clarke calls it when he fatuously compares it to The Shining and The Exorcist.
Traditionally a vampire has been a villain, lives the glamorous lifestyle of an immortal in a castle. In this movie, the vampire is a child, lives in a crappy flat and has no friends. Set in 1970s Sweden in winter, it is about as bleak as it gets. Oskar, a friendless, bullied child who lives next door meets the vampire and the two of them find that they are kindred spirits.
There are two things which recommend this movie, the new take on the vampire genre and the acting of the child vampire. Detracting from it is the movies slow pace. Even the opening credits (plain white text on black) took an age. I hate that, unless you have really fancy credits that are worth watching, just get on with it. Visuals are pretty good though the incessant darkness and cold tends to get dreary after two hours. The child vampire is really excellent and she expresses the right kind of other-worldliness. The main child-protagonist (Oskar) however is very awkward and frankly annoying. He seems to be put in mainly because of his goofy "children of the corn" looks, and the camera takes full advantage of this taking rather too many opportunities to show him semi-naked.
The other main flaws are a very silly scene involving CGI cats and the climax, which is too contrived and too "Deus ex machina" and utterly predictable. The horror/gore aspect does not succeed and the director's efforts at shocking moments are good but for me they do not really shock. The movie is most memorable for its mood in the tender scenes between the two children.
This is exactly the kind of movie that critics love - genre busting, anti-Hollywood, foreign language, low budget. It is all of these things and in truth it is a pretty good effort. But it is a very long way from being the greatest horror movie this century, as the Irish Times movie critic Donald Clarke calls it when he fatuously compares it to The Shining and The Exorcist.
Traditionally a vampire has been a villain, lives the glamorous lifestyle of an immortal in a castle. In this movie, the vampire is a child, lives in a crappy flat and has no friends. Set in 1970s Sweden in winter, it is about as bleak as it gets. Oskar, a friendless, bullied child who lives next door meets the vampire and the two of them find that they are kindred spirits.
There are two things which recommend this movie, the new take on the vampire genre and the acting of the child vampire. Detracting from it is the movies slow pace. Even the opening credits (plain white text on black) took an age. I hate that, unless you have really fancy credits that are worth watching, just get on with it. Visuals are pretty good though the incessant darkness and cold tends to get dreary after two hours. The child vampire is really excellent and she expresses the right kind of other-worldliness. The main child-protagonist (Oskar) however is very awkward and frankly annoying. He seems to be put in mainly because of his goofy "children of the corn" looks, and the camera takes full advantage of this taking rather too many opportunities to show him semi-naked.
The other main flaws are a very silly scene involving CGI cats and the climax, which is too contrived and too "Deus ex machina" and utterly predictable. The horror/gore aspect does not succeed and the director's efforts at shocking moments are good but for me they do not really shock. The movie is most memorable for its mood in the tender scenes between the two children.