Let the right one in Homework

Here is my Let the right one in homework from a while back that i had written on paper but now i am going to write it up on my blog thats why its a little late on here...

I would not class myself as a horror fan, I do not like horror films because sometimes i find them to be too unrealistic for example insidious etc... But also whenever I have watched a horror film i generally start to get nightmares which i do not like because i dont really like to be scared. Horror films from around the world are not that accessible to me because when i do watch horror films i would like to watch it in english because you don't have to think much about what your watching. And the language barrier doesn't really pose a problem to me when watching a horror film from another country because i can rad it simply but sometimes ill watch a film to relax and not think and subtitles would make me think if i am trying to relax.

A trailer would try to convince you to watch a film in the cinema generally by montaging the 'best bits' or 'exciting bits' of the film  together this would make the target audience think that they must see it because the film consists a lot of what was cut together, but most times they were the best parts of the film in the trailer so can be disappointing sometimes to certain people expecting more of what the trailer showed. And sometimes they would have to be out of the ordinary and something fresh so that people will want to see it because its like nothing they have seen before. And if it is out of the ordinary it gets people to talk about it and the more they talk hype begins and then everyone would want to see it because they want fit in which was a theory  by Blumler and Katz which was personal relationships.

Familiar Conventions of a horror film;

• In this film there is a lot of blood as you would expect in a horror film
• Action moments for example a fight or murder
• There are vampires, you would usually expect something or someone to be out of the ordinary
• Scary moments that put you on the edge of your seat and makes you feel fear
• And a main character that you like and may come across various events that are horrific

Let the right one in has different approaches to horror like; 

• Meaningful love - between the young boy and the girl vampire
• Two children, generally children aren't the main characters of horror films
• The girl saves the boy which normally never happens as the girl would typically play the damsel in distress

I think in this film it is clearly shown visually who are the outsiders because Eli is not dressed like a typical girl, as she wears a long hospital like gound with long grey boring hair and always has the facial expression of looking sad. Oskar is also an 'Outsider' because when we see him in school he always tends to be on his own and we constantly see him being bullied by the other boys for looking like a "pig." We know that Eli is very different to the others and that is clearly shown at the beginning of the film, but she seems to instantly bond with Oskar as he is also different to the other 'normal' kids. But later on in the film we realise that eli is a true outsider altogether as she turns out to be a vampire that eats humans, which us as the audience expected but Oskar did not see this event coming. After Oskar finds out she is a vampire her appearance changes from how she was always seen to Oskar to now having blood on her face and a whole darker tone to her skin, this visual representation now clearly indicates that she is different to the people she is with.

My personal response to the characters is that i like Oskar because he is a innocent kid who is being constantly bullied and victimised by other boys. Although he is a bit disturbed, for example when he has the knife with intentions to kill i still like him because as the audience you want to see him overcome the bullies once and for all. Then because i like Oskar when he meets Eli i liked her because you can tell she wants to be his friend and that she could help him overcome the bullies. And as the story progresses we tend to like the characters more as their relationship grows stronger and begin to fall in love. I think people in general would like both these characters for the relationship they have and how they both would give up everything for each other which is what i think people would relate to the most. And even tho Eli is killing innocent people for food us as the audience still warm to her because we understand her story and understand why she is doing this.

In this film i did enjoy the narrative a lot and it appealed to me in many ways one of which was that Oskar was being bullied, and by him being bullied it made me want to help him overcome this bulling because we can see what he is going through and i want to help him. And this tension builds up throughout the narrative until finally Oskar overcomes this fear barrier he has and attacks the bully, this moment for me was a relief and made me feel happy for the character which was good because it made me emotionally connect with the character. I liked when the father of Eli kills the man in the forrest because that is the point where the plot of the story goes from normal day life to something out of the ordinary as the man murders someone, hangs them upside down to get the blood from him, i like this section because for me it was the point of the film where i was 'woken up' and i knew more scary and action scenes were on there way. On the other hand i didn't really like the story of the men trying to kill the vampire because i though it was completely irrelevant to the story as a whole and i didn't connect to the narrative as much as i did in other sections.

Eli and Oskar's relationship is unusual because they are so different as she is a human eating vampire and he is just a human, which is unusual because Eli eats humans for food but falls for Oskar even tho he is a human. If Eli was not a vampire and just a human the film would be completely different as i think it wouldn't even be a horror anymore and more of a romance. and if she was not a vampire she would have to change how she is for example how she acts, dresses and how she goes about things. As well as changing her you would have to change the settings and the mood created from the film  itself like removing the night time scenes to daytime and possibly change the music used throughout the film that creates a horror and tense mood.

I dont think from this film you would be scared of the vampire because we see a loving and caring side of the vampire's including the dad as we se the love he has for his daughter. I think this film is trying to show the the vampires in  a good and bad like because we also see the dark side of them and the bad actions they have to do in order to survive. At points in the film she is very scary but we as the audience are not intended to be scared of her but it is use to clearly show us that she is different and scary to the other people in the film. The only times i think we are encouraged to be scared of the vampires are when Eli hides in the dark and we don't known when she will strike this are the most scariest scenes in my opinion because she is killing the innocent people but after she kills we see the remorse she has so we then understand her feelings and emotions so we understand why as she does this therefore we would not be scared by her.

Eli's Father is also not a typical vampire as he wants to look after his daughter and please her so he gets her blood from and innocent man for her to have. But we see him being very remorseful and see that he doesn't really want to kill these innocent people, we see this when he is in the changing room and is about to kill the young man but then he gets scared and goes and hides, and pours burning liquid on his face to hide his identity but w do see that he doesn't want to do this and that he has to in order to please his daughter (Eli). Also we don't see his vampire like actions but we see him killing these people with knives to collect the blood from these innocent victims rather than the typical vampire actions. I think the relatiomship between Eli and her father is unique because she seems like she has the power and that he wants to please his daughter because she gets angry at him for not getting the blood. This shows that she tells her dad what to do like she takes advantage that he cares for her and she is the only thing that he is living for.