Let The Right One In
[Rating: 7/10]

Oskar is a meek twelve-year-old boy who often gets bullied. Secretly he’s into macabre and violent things. One day a middle-aged man and a young girl move into the apartment next door around the same time a string of bloody murders happen in the neighbourhood, and as Oskar befriends the girl, he comes to know out the dark secret she habours.

First-off, let me say that this film is not for everyone. It is about vampires but it is not your typical vampire story, and secondly some of the violent scenes involve kids and may be disturbing to some people.

This is the first swedish film I’ve watched to my knowledge, and it was actually pretty good. The setting of the show is very bleak and dark, but it’s given since it’s a perpectually wintry sort of place and it sets the right mood for the show. It is not action-packed but very subtle in the way information is revealed. For example I have a suspicion that Hakan used to be in Oskar’s shoes a long-time ago, except that time has caught up with him and he has aged whereas Eli remained a child. Vampires are not portrayed here as an evil race but there is no sweet-coating the fact that they have to drink human blood to survive or they’ll start to get druggie-like withdrawal symptoms. Also I think that this is the first time I’ve seen a movie deal with the question – what happens if a vampire sets foot into a place they’ve not been invited into? As a character I found Oskar rather disturbing on many levels, even compared to Eli, Hakan and the bullies. I did not understand his ‘die you pig’ scene or macabre obsession, although it may be that he’s just supressing his anger towards the bullies. He took the fact that Eli was a vampire very nonchalantly, too nonchalantly I think, although it could be due to his strange quirks and the fact that children are probably more willing to believe in fantastical creatures rather than adults, who’d think it was a lie or just freak out (going in vein of other types of similar stories). And ooh, the scene where Eli savagely attacks the bullies at the end was very brutal even though they didn’t show what happened – I guess I got squicked since they’re still kids. I expected her to attack Jimmy at least, but the others? Hm, I’d say this show plays on the what is right and wrong issue quite a bit.

That said, the cast was pretty outstanding, especially the two main actors. Eli was probably my favourite character of the lot. I could feel her convinctions clashing as she ended up reluctantly letting Oskar befriend her and the scenes with the Rubik’s Cube were cute, so were the scenes in their budding relationship that provided a nice balance with the gloominess and murders. Honestly I thought this would be more of a horror show because of the promotional material (the posters mostly) and generally horror where kids are involved seem to be much more sinister so I avoid them. But I’m glad that I actually caught it because it was more of a normal drama with a mystery element rather than horror. Also it was quite unique to what I have seen so far. I don’t watch a ton of arthouse or european films although this hasn’t really converted me yet, but it was definitely something different.

Tokyo Ghost Trip

[Rating: 6/10]

Genre: Supernatural, Mystery

The Inui family are praticing spirit mediums. When the head of the family suddenly disappears, the next descendants in line, three brothers, are forced to enter this business so that they can keep the company going and pay off the debts that have been accumulating.

I have a mixed opinion about this one. In some ways it exceeded my expectations and in other ways it fell short of certain things. I was glad that it was not a horror show despite the name, but the storyline for each ep was pretty repetitive, and the fact that the boys were constantly obsessed with craving after meat got a bit overused. I mean, yeah, they’re on a tight budget but it’s understood. I also could have taken a bit more suspense and tension. Things were a bit too obvious or guessable. On anotherhand, action sequences were surprisingly well-done with some slick movements, and the twist at the end about Sowa was surprising to say the least. My favourite character was Kai, the eldest brother played by Kiriyama Ren because I felt that he was the only sane and levelheaded one of the lot~ On the whole it was a decent effort though.

[Rating: 7.5/10]

Genre: Historical, Paranormal

Kuroshitsuji is a somewhat dark anime that takes place in Victorian England. It centers around the main chracter Sebastian Michaelis, one demon of a butler (pun intended!), who has a binding pact with Ciel Phantomhive, the young and remaining heir of the powerful Phantomhive family. Due to the Phantomhives’ strong ties with the throne, Ciel is often sent to investigate mysteries for the Queen and Sebastian aids him, often ending up being the one to save his life. Of course, there’s always more to it than meets the eye…

Ok, given that I have not read the manga, I found that the anime was rather mediocre in terms of plot, three main things kept me watching:

1) Sebastian Michaelis is one of the more compelling lead anime characters I’ve seen. Ciel was nothing in comparison to him and indeed he’d have been nothing (aka dead) if Sebastian hadn’t saved his ass those years ago.

2) Most of my bachelor’s degree centered around the historical and literary studies of Victorian Gothic literature, so the setting itself was an attraction to me, and to my delight, they did attempt to throw some actual historical events/places/people into the fray of the happenings, even though most of it was wrongly dated. Then again I closed an eye because I believe Kuroshitsuji is meant to be set in a parellel world of Victorian England rather than actual Victorian England (sort of like the city in the Golden Compass trilogy mirroring real Oxford but with daemons and steampunk technology).

3) On a lesser level, I was also curious to find out what happens in the end. Would Ciel honour the pact with Sebastian and would Sebastian actually take the soul of his young master who he had grown somewhat fond of? Since I was rather impartial towards Ciel, I wasn’t really bothered at the end, but still glad that it was done gently. Dare I say it was somewhat poetic?

Also, a couple of the secondary characters were not bad. I actually quite liked Ash before it turned out that he was Angela. Can I please deny his boobage~ Ash is actually quite cool whereas his counterpart is a psychotic bitch. I admit that was certainly a twist I did not expect. I thought they might be related or something, but that was about it… And Plu is a pretty awesome dog, his fire breathing destructiveness aside, he was like this huge puppy who just wanted some TLC. I wish that there had been a bit more about the Undertaker because he was wonderfully eccentric and insane. I think he had the best voice actor of the lot. If there is a second season, I do want to see Undertaker’s face! I won’t be surprised if he’s actually quite good looking despite the scar running across one side. The three servants in the Phantomhive mansion were really annoying at first, but the episode that showed there background made me soften up to them a bit… I know people can be clumsy (myself included) but it’s just that from the beginning those three were so incompetant! They’re awesome at kicking butt though… and Ciel will never know how much he owes them his precious life every other night. Ciel wasn’t the most likeable character to me because he was generally bratty, naive and selfish. Sebastian practically did all the hard bits of the investigation for him and the way he treated Elizabeth was pretty harsh. I dunno, but I’ve never really understood the whole ‘living for the sake of vengance’ thing before. And concerning the music, it was one of the few times I’ve actually enjoyed an opening or ending song. Usually I just skip past the credits at the start and end. The sequence of chibi Sebastian getting prepared for the day was cute~