Bizarre

[bcholmes]

Let Me In, the American remake of the Swedish film, Let the Right One In, is bizarre in its fidelity to the Swedish film. To the point that I'm perplexed that it was remade. (A part of me is not perplexed: I understand that there are movie-goers who can't wrap their heads around subtitles, but I just don't get such people).

The differences are slight: some characters have been eliminated. Notably, the cat lady. We see less of the neighbours, in general. The American version ditches the implication that Eli/Abby is a castrated boy. The one thing that is better framed in the American version is the role of the Håkan character (played by Richard Jenkins -- his character is given a name, at one point, in the American version but he's credited as "The Father"). The American version more firmly establishes that the Håkan character started out just like Oskar/Owen -- a young boy who befriended Eli/Abby, but who has grown old after years and years of travel together.

I like this particular reading -- even while you're watching the unfolding relationship between Eli/Abby and Oskar/Owen, you know that Oskar/Owen is probably going to grow up to be another Håkan. The Swedish version doesn't provide as clear a grounding on this point, and leaves open the creepy interpretation that Håkan is a pedophile. The book, apparently, clearly situates Håkan as a pedophile. I think the American version makes him a more tragic figure.

In the Swedish version of the film, the penultimate conflict involves Virginia's boyfriend, Lacke, who becomes convinced that Eli is responsible for killing Virginia. In the American version, it's the Police Detective, who'd been investigating the murders (which he thinks are related to some Satanic cult) who enters Abby's apartment.

The American film starts in media res -- giving it a stronger, more action-y opening -- before cutting back to "Two weeks earlier".

So, there are differences, but what's really striking is how whole scenes are virtually identical. The pool scene, for example, is almost identical in both versions of the film. In general, I'm not sure that the American version really needed to be made.

I expect it'll be interesting to compare the Swedish and American versions of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. But I can't say that that's a film that needs to be remade, either.

I've always really liked comparing different versions of films. I've recently been watching the 1946 and 1984 versions of The Razor's Edge. I hadn't actually seen the 1984 version since it first came out, and I was surprised that it was much better than I remembered it. While I think that the 1946 version of Elliot Templeton is a much more fun character, in general, I find the 1946 version depends too heavily on people telling you what they're feeling.

I think this goes back to my days in theatre. Theatre is an interpretive art: it's (usually) all about interpreting an existing text. What choices do the actors and director make? Is your Lady Macbeth the cruelly ambitious "woman behind the man"-type, as Jeanette Nolan interprets her? Or the emotionally immature and greedy Lady Macbeth of Francesca Annis? Increasingly, film is like that, and I really enjoy seeing how people make different choices in film. How is the new Spider-Man going to be different than the last Spider-Man? How is the upcoming remake of The Great Gatsby going to be different from the Robert Redford version? Or the 2000 television film with Mira Sorvino?

I think I'd suggest that, if the choices aren't different in different theatre productions, then your production is kind of pointless. And, sadly, I think that Let Me In, despite being a really good, solid film, is kinda pointless in a world where we already have Let the Right One In.

Comments

[veejane]

a young boy who befriended Eli/Abby, but who has grown old after years and years of travel together

Yes, I preferred that reading of the Swedish film too. I didn't even know it was based on a book till later (and honestly, the book sounds wicked OTT in ways that wouldn't work on film).

I'm not planning to see the American version particularly, but it strikes me kind of funny that they would cut the cat-lady stuff. I loved that part! How the cats all came up leaping and screaming, the villain in their midst obvious to them but not to anybody else.