Last DVD/Movie you bought or watched?

[sauvin]

I suppose they could have fallen in with a rag-tag group of other young vampires and terrorized the human race for a while, but that's a different story, yet to be written. By someone else.

"Oskar?"

"Yeah?"

"Umm... we've been together for quite a while, now. I don't want to break up, not ever, but you know, you're not the same guy you were when we first met."

"Umm?"

"So, maybe I'm not the same person I was when we first met, either."

"OK... and... ?"

"I know it's only been sixty or seventy years now, but I'm really afraid you'll get tired of me someday."

"Maybe, maybe not, but probably not this week or next..."

"So, I'm thinking we could bite a few kids and have a family."

"Hmm. Never thought of that. Make sure they're kids who can't beat me at bulleri bulleri bock..."

"Seriously, though, what do you think?"

"Eli, you gotta do me a favour if we ever break up...."

"What?"

"You gotta never try to make family out of anybody who's older than twelve (more or less) and younger than forty."

"What? Why?"

"Because some slack-jawed drooling American who watches too much porn on the Internet and makes awful monster movie remakes will make some kind of beach party romp out of it. It'll be full of bikinis and blood and beer and couples with no clothes on doing stupid and gross things together, and there'll be lots of stupid music."

[metoo]

[...]Another thought to cross my mind are the Standford and Milgram experiments. "The experiment's results", Wikipedia tells us, "favor situational attribution of behavior over dispositional attribution (a result caused by internal characteristics). It seemed that the situation, rather than their individual personalities, caused the participants' behavior". Oskar had already exhibited some antisocial tendencies in the movie (and much more so in the novel) presumably encumbered by the need to continue co-existing with (or surviving) other people. Oskar unfettered may very well indeed be an Oskar changed into something we might not recognise, or care for. His is now the life of an apex predator, and now has little need to concern himself with other people in any practical - except to remain near enough to centres of population large enough to sustain him. He may, in other words, become morally and emotionally exactly what his new physical circumstances demand: something other than completely human.[...]

Regarding Oskar's antisocial tendencies, at least in the novel Oskar's fantasies about being a killer was just that. When he finally had used plenty of violence and defeated Jonny, he felt victorious for only a brief moment. Then he saw Jonny, and the pain he had caused, and he was filled with empathy rather that victory.

I interpret Oskar's behaviour when Eli attacked Lacke in the light of the above. Oskar backed away from the carnage, hid in the living room, hands on his ears, humming to drench the noises from the bathroom. And subsequently he turned Eli's offer to "become like me" down. Oskar, I think, couldn't envision himself doing what he would be required to do.

However, JAL made Oskar eventually change his mind. In LtODD Eli and Oskar are seen mixing blood, with the expected outcome that Oskar would become "like Eli". And indeed he was, since he shows up, unchanged, in a photograph taken almost 30 years later.

Now, did Oskar keep the capacity for empathy, or did he loose it? If he kept it, he might live a very miserable life. If he lost it, Eli might regret it all.

I favour the view that he kept it, but learnt to cope. I hear Eli saying to him, many times: "Don't think about them. You mustn't think about them!" And then Eli would set off running, shouting "Last one to the end of the street is a rotten herring"... (What did Eli say in the English translation of the novel before O&E ran to the Lover's Kiosk?)

[gattoparde59]

Would the vampire Oskar remain a sympathetic character from our point of view? Interesting question which I can't answer.

The line from the novel is "Last one in is a rotten egg!" which leads Oskar to think of an Swedish old children's film, or film series which English speakers would not recognize anyway. It is intended to make Eli's language sound dated and out of sync with the world around him.

[Jameron]

...shouting "Last one to the end of the street is a rotten herring"... (What did Eli say in the English translation of the novel before O&E ran to the Lover's Kiosk?)

‘OK. Last one there is a rotten egg.’

Lindqvist, John Ajvide (2010-10-11). Let the Right One In (p. 133). Quercus. Kindle Edition.

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[metoo]

Would the vampire Oskar remain a sympathetic character from our point of view? Interesting question which I can't answer.

Yes ... and no. O&E would play games, read books, whatever appropriate to their developmental age. I think watching them on these occasions would be quite endearing. However, they would also spend some time planning for the next feeding. And then they would feed. And then ... cover up.

The line from the novel is "Last one in is a rotten egg!" which leads Oskar to think of an Swedish old children's film, or film series which English speakers would not recognize anyway. It is intended to make Eli's language sound dated and out of sync with the world around him.

‘OK. Last one there is a rotten egg.’

Lindqvist, John Ajvide (2010-10-11). Let the Right One In (p. 133). Quercus. Kindle Edition.

Thanks!

The Swedish novel uses the phrase "sisten dit är en rutten sill", which in several ways is archaic. It means "the last one there is a rotten herring".

[Bloody Mary]

May (2002), in which an awkward, fragile girl who has no friends tries to find some, and then sails off the deep end when one after another doesn't work out. May is so frail and pathetic that I ended up pitying her more than anything else. It's billed as a horror, but I wouldn't say it's frightening so much as depressing. And gross.

[EEA]

Right Now Wrong Then.

[a_contemplative_life]

This film scared me as a kid. I think it still holds up pretty darn well, 45 years later. Funny to see how young Gene Hackman looks.

[a_contemplative_life]

Saw this on the shelf of a used bookstore and couldn't resist for $6 bucks. It's kinda cheesy in an '80's sort of way, but the story is good and the acting is passable. The special effects are dated but the dragon still looks pretty good. Caitlin Clarke is cute in a tom-boyish sort of way.

[Jameron]

The Girl With All the Gifts.



Fairly good, low key, British film. Certain parts of the book were missing but that's to be expected.

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