Ogwaros Iwenâl

Blood Diamond – A decent action/adventure that thinks a bit too highly of itself.

Cashback – A strange movie that has absolutely no idea what it wants to be.  Is this a romantic drama?  A college sex comedy?  A sci-fi erotica thriller?  A pretentious arthouse film?  I honestly don’t know.  It defies genre categorization which would be a great thing if it weren’t so incohesive.  It’s extremely well shot in portions, though, and I can’t say it was a complete waste of time.

Futurama: Bender’s Game – There is something horribly wrong with these Futurama direct-to-DVD movies.  Yes, it’s still Futurama.  But none of these movies have had enough energy to sustain their full running times.  And they don’t work when split up into 30 minute episodes either.  Just weak overall.  I did get a few laughs out of it, though.

You pretty much need a flowchart to understand Primer.  You might need a flowchart for the flowchart.  I don’t think I’ve ever not understood a movie the first time through until now.  Even Donnie Darko was more understandable.

What a moebius strip of a movie… and not necessarily in the enjoyable ways.

Let The Right One In is a Swedish film about a twelve-year-old boy named Oskar and his relationship with a young girl named Eli.  Oskar is bullied constantly at school.  Sometimes it’s innocuous name calling; he’s called a pig despite his skinniness.  Other times the bullying turns violent, as when he is whipped with a switch in the school yard, severely scratching Oskar’s face as he stands silently.  “I fell on a rock” he explains to his mother.

One night, Eli moves nextdoor with her father.  Her father is a loner who rejects invitations to hang out with the neighbors.  Eli is a strange child, who smells funny, who isn’t bothered by the cold, and seemingly only comes out at night.  But she is quite lonely, and quickly forms a bond with Oskar.  Young love is a sweet, if awkward, thing.

Did I mention that Eli is a vampire?

Yes, Let The Right One In is a vampire movie.  But mostly in the fact that one of the main characters is a vampire.  For the most part, though, it is a meditation on youth, young love, and the nature of violence.  These thematic elements elevate Let The Right One In above its “grr argh” brethren.

The relationship between Oskar and Eli is sweet, awkward and often disturbing.  On the surface, the story is about two lonely twelve year olds falling for each other.  But, being a vampire, Eli is in fact much older than she appears.  While she could be a twelve year old in mind, there are dark hints that she may be manipulating Oskar for her own purposes.

What reasons would you apply violence?  To feel powerful?  To fit in with others?  Revenge?  For food?  To protect the one you love?  Or would you rather die than live with violence?  We see instances of each of these in the film, to the varying reactions of the characters.

Sound is very important to the mood of the film.  Vampire hunger mixes in sounds of a low growling as that of a rumbling stomach and that of lips smacking hungrily.  The sharpness of the crunching of snow fits with the bleak winter landscapes.  The score for the film is quite excellent, though sparsely used.  The cinematography of the film is well done, mixing in elements of horror in appropriate scenes.  The well-shot penultimate scene is simultaneously shockingly violent and hauntingly beautiful.

In short, I really love this film, but I don’t know how I feel about the events of the film.  It’s sweet and beautiful, yet creepy and disturbing.  There’s a great amount of ambiguity in the film, which works in its favor.  Without going into spoilers, I’m conflicted about whether the ending is happy or sad.  It will depend on your own perspective on things.  I’ve watched it twice and still haven’t decided.

I think I may read the original novel, though I’m afraid the extra detail a novel can provide will remove that ambiguity…

Recommended, though I would highly recommend watching it in the original Swedish with English subtitles.  And with the theatrical subtitles if at all possible.

-.- .. … …

I listen to a lot of music, and I tend to do so on headphones.  I’ve been using some Sony studio-style headphones for some time – I believe I bought them in 1999 or 2000.  They’ve certainly served me well, but the headband was beginning to snap and I’ve begun to notice distortion for louder volumes.  So I ordered a pair of Sennheiser HD 202s.

Wow.

The headphones themselves block out a good deal of ambient noise.  And the clarity is such an improvement – I’m picking up all sorts of nuances that I never noticed that much before.  One of the reviews on Amazon described the sound reproduction as being “analytical” and I can kind of see what the reviewer meant by that.  Certain genres or instrumentations may be a bit too clear, almost deconstructed.  I’m not sure if that is necessarily a bad thing, or just simply different.

My only real complaint so far is that they’re a bit too bulky for use on the bus.  They’re perfect at home, though, which is where I get the most use out of them anyway.

“A killing tree.”

Krod Mandoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire is trash.  But it’s my kind of trash so far.  Sort of a Robin Hood: Men in Tights – The Series.  But it might take itself a little bit too seriously in spots.