vampire movies!

I’m not a vampire person per se. Don’t get me wrong — I love vampires and all, due to my tremendous nerd-love for all things supernatural and sci-fi, but they don’t resonate with me the way zombies do, you feel me? (Why? Because of my zombie heritage?) But in any case, this year, I got to see two wildly different vampire flicks — “Let the Right One In” and “Twilight.”

First off, do you ever notice that vampire movies usually involve a romance? Is that b/c this is a Hollywood thing or are vampire innately romance-inspiring creatures? If you really think about it, isn’t making out with a vampire like inter-species hooking up akin to bestiality? Anyway, I digress.

“Twilight,” of course, is the pre-teen fantasy where the new girl falls for the good-looking vampire kid. The books were like crack — poor in quality and addictive. It’s a fun read, but you’re super aware of how bad the writing is, and dude, the film might be WORSE. The vampires are all played by cute actors who are not even remotely threatening — no grrr in their voices, no weird transformation when they suck blood. Edward, the lead character, has skin that looks like it’s covered in Cover Girl gold sparkly eye shadow when he’s in sunlight, thus cursing him to a lonely life in the shadows. There were two scenes I loved — when he saves her from a car and when they walk into the school parking lot as a couple for the first time, but the rest is ridiculous. And I don’t know why — but the clothes really bugged me. (That trash-talking said, I would totally see it again. WOW.)

“Let the Right One In” is a Swedish flick about a child vampire and this 12-year-old chick bites, growls, and shows all kinds of violence. My friend Alex’s husband described it as “an adorable vampire story,” but then again, he’s a horror film maker. Aside from feeling confused, I thought it was a “realistic” tale of vampirism? Like what happens when you get hungry, how often you have to move, when murders go wrong. Whatever. There is a romance, but the picture is a little freaky with its violence, so I don’t know that I’d describe it as heart-warming. Every time something perplexing happened, my friend Nancy said “That’s so Swedish.”