I recently watched Let the Right One in and was talking about it to a fellow film enthusiast at work. To my horror, he informed me that there was now an American remake of the film–Let Me In. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against Americans, but I don’t understand why there is a deep-seated need in Hollywood to remake any good film that happened to be made outside the US and happened to do well.
Let the Right One in is a brilliant, beautiful movie, full of atmosphere and innocence tainted with bloodshed. It was balanced, the story and plot were well done and well executed, and it didn’t need to be remade. It’s barely a few years old. There was no need for this remake to happen, and I can only be certain that some of the beauty and feeling in the original film/book is going to be lost in translation as it travels across the pond to be covered in Hollywood glitz.
I have seen numerous films suffer from the desire for everything to be set in America/be not subtitled. The Seven Samurai, Zatoichi, Ju-on, Ringu, all brilliant Japanese films that have been remade to fit American audiences when they should have just let everyone see and appreciate the originals.
So what if you have to read subtitles to follow the film. It really doesn’t make viewing the film difficult. I do it all the time with Japanese / Hong Kong films/anime and it’s no bother at all (Oh, which reminds me, you all know that The Departed is a remake of the excellent Hong Kong film, Infernal Affairs, right?)
Let the Right One in had a brilliant world-film feel about it. It was a simple but deep plot, with scenes that followed the daily actions of a young lonely boy and a young-looking vampire without fuss or overcomplicating them. They spoke for themselves, standing out and creating a film that really did strike me as something amazing.
To me, it had an air about it that reminded me of Night Watch. That film really had an impact on me visually, and the plot was good enough to make it an entertaining film. Day Watch was poor in comparison. The intervention by big foreign movie companies ruined what could have been a great follow up to the first film, turning it into a farce. They even wanted to film it in English!
Really, can the big screenwriters not think of their own original stories to write. Do we have to remake everything?
Cinema seems to be going through some sort of remake hell right now. There are films that are barely a few years old that are getting remade… and don’t get me started on remaking classics like Clash of the Titans! (and killing the most important part of the plot while they’re at it!)
End Rant!
