bloody cold

the nation of sweden is not known for producing genre films. when we consider cinema sweden we tend to think of the great ingmar bergman's psycho-sociological studies of faith, love and death. but blood and guts, monsters and bogeyman, just doesn't leap to mind.

at least i don't. in fact, i can't recall a single swedish horror film, period. swedish exploitation films, yes, after all if you came of age in the 1970s then you probably had at least heard the phrase swedish erotica, which were a series of porn movies released to the scumotoriums and grindhouses in the u.s. and there are the sexploitation flicks of american born joe sarno who made many movies in sweden with swedish actors, including one of his more infamous films jag - en oskuld. but i'm pressed to think of one swedish horror movie.

there are very few movies i look forward to seeing. i rarely go to the theaters prefering to see movies on disc. perhaps it's because there seems to be a glut of superhero movies out there. i like superheroes but lately that seems the only type of flick hollywood is willing to produce. well, superheroes and bad remakes of current genre films from both europe and asia. enough!

so now then i'm reading rave reviews of the swedish vampire flick let the right one in directed by tomas alfredson, this is his first genre movie, and based on the novel by john ajvide lindqvist. i know very little about the source material and alfredson is a totally new director to me. yet, a few searches on the net and watching the trailer a couple of times and, well, i'm stoked. the movie is a love story of two twelve year olds, one a bullied boy and the other a vampire. i'm not big on the vampire mythos. i find the vampire too romantic and melancholy a figure to find sympathetic. if i had my choice between a roomful of gut-munching zombies or the company of a sad, distant and lonely un-alive soul, i'll take my chances with the gut-munchers.

still, this film is scheduled - i think, i hope so at any rate - to open at one of sac's arthouses, the crest, on 11-28. i've marked the date.