Boys Don’t Cry: Puberty and Abuse in LET THE RIGHT ONE IN
This month at Dread Central, we’re celebrating creepy kids in horror films. And one of the most vivid images of creepy kids embedded in my sorry little brain comes from Let The Right One In. This amazingly layered Swedish gem is scary in the traditional movie sense, of course, but that isn’t the reason this film made me shiver in my seat. It was the intricate depiction of bullying, abuse and puberty, rather than blood-sucking vampires, that froze me stiff. After watching the film, I wanted to know more, so I ordered a copy of the novel from Amazon. To my surprise, the book delves much deeper into the pangs of puberty and abuse, than it does into vampirism. So today, I want to celebrate Oskar, Eli, and how Let the Right One In helped me process some of the abuse I experienced growing up.
The Film
If you’re not familiar with the movie, then let me pull up this quick summary from the film’s IMDb page:
Oskar, a bullied 12-year old, dreams of revenge. He falls in love with Eli, a peculiar girl. She can’t stand the sun or food and to come into a room she needs to be invited. Eli gives Oskar the strength to hit back but when he realizes that Eli needs to drink other people’s blood to live he’s faced with a choice. How much can love forgive? Set in the Stockholm suburb of Blackeberg in 1982.
As you can see, even from this brief description, it is possible to tell that the film is no tale of sparkling vamps. The source material is phenomenal, a profound exploration of the dark side of humanity, and director Tomas Alfredson’s interpretation of the novel upon which the film is based is spot on. But as good as Alfredson’s film is, time constraints make it inevitable that some of the novel’s important subject matter will be left on the cutting room floor.
The Novel
The more I look back on the novel, the more I realize its brilliance. John Ajvide Lindqvist’s masterpiece will be remembered throughout history as one of the great vampire tales of all time, right alongside Stoker’s Dracula. While it can be argued that Dracula focuses heavily on the horrors the titular Count is capable of, however, Let the Right One In’s relevance comes from its accurate depiction of the horrors that mankind is capable of bestowing upon each other.
Oskar’s life, as he’s bullied, ignored and irrelevant, is so horrible as to make it seem less bad to have a blood-sucking fiend as a friend. And yet, this setup is not as bleak as realizing that many, including myself, have walked Oskar’s shoes for just as many miles. Not only that, but the novel also goes deep into Eli’s past.
It may be a surprise to those who haven’t read the novel, but when Eli says “I’m not a girl”, it not only means she’s a vampire. She was, in fact, a boy. Or at least, she was assigned as such at birth. There’s a scene in the film which hints at this, as it shows her crotch with stitches. In the novel, it is specified that Eli had been castrated centuries prior. Considering the time at which the novel was released, I am amazed at how popular it, and the films which are based on it, are. It saddens me to acknowledge that the subject of sexuality and gender is still an area of basic human rights which is severely misunderstood (and wrongfully hated upon). And though Eli’s incredible journey will surely be more meaningful to those of you who have also walked it, it was Oskar’s life that echoed with me the most.
The Fan
I was born in a tiny town in Paraguay, on December 28th, 1985. I was fortunate enough to never want for food, shelter or education. In fact, my parents were working professionals, which afforded me a higher standard of living than a lot of my peers. In rural Paraguay, however, this material stability came at a cost.
The lesser of the evils, I’d say, was to basically never see my parents. Having spoken to them about this in the intervening years, it is clear that they do not remember it as I do. But my memories of growing up are not made up of times spent with my parents. They are instead filled with lessons I was taught by whoever happened to be working at my house. I understand that my parents were working very hard to make sure we didn’t want for anything, and I appreciate their efforts.
But I never really got to know them until I grew up myself. I have a good relationship with both, though they are now separated. I wish, however, that I could remember more of them, and how they were with me as parents when I was growing up.
I see Oskar’s endless wanderings on his own, and his hidden collection of disturbing memorabilia, as a mirror image of some of the coping mechanisms I used to try and develop a personality. But it is the bullying to which he’s subjected that really struck a chord.
The Connection
Ever since I started 1st grade at my local public school, I was a target. My family was considered to be well-off, and a lot of my classmates were from extremely poor neighbouring areas. Though I do not begrudge them a behavior that originated, most likely, out of poverty, the truth is that they beat the crap out of me for years. For three whole years, in fact, I was a bank in the shape of a punching bag, as they beat me again and again to take my lunch money.
One of my most vivid memories of this time in my life is one of me, kneeling down in a secluded spot during recess. I’d covered myself up with my uniform, in a sort of cocoon. I was pretending to be a dragon in a chrysalis, just waiting for the opportune time to emerge, deadly fire-breath at the ready, to avenge my mistreatment.
Bullying was considered part of the school experience in Paraguay back then. In fact, to this day, most Paraguayan parents “don’t believe” in psychology, nor want to send kids to get mental health help. So, my parents did what they thought would help: they enrolled me in Kung Fu classes.
Though I wish I didn’t have to resort to martial arts to not be abused, Kung Fu gave me more than I could ever hope. Sure, I was able to defend myself, and by the end of the school year, I was no longer regularly beaten. Over the next couple of years, only a handful of the older kids gave it a shot, and I’m happy to say, I lived to tell the tale. But Kung Fu gave me more than that: it gave me discipline. Friends. Something to aspire to. I received my black belt as I got into high school, and when I served in the Paraguayan Army, the lessons learned in that dingy gym in my home town really came into their own.
The Conclusion
Digression aside, I understand Oskar’s plight. Kung Fu was my Eli, in a way. It allowed me to overcome my oppressors. When I was being beaten to a pulp in the 90s, I was even the same age as Oskar and Eli were in the film. But watching the film all those years later, I’d realized something quite profound, something that hadn’t really occurred to me. And I want to share it with you, before we part ways.
Kung Fu, like Eli, allowed me to overcome oppression. But much like Oskar at the end of the film, I had not, perhaps even to this day, realized the full extent of the trauma I had endured. I had not realized, I’m sure, the severity of the abuse I’d suffered, or the implications of the choices I’d made to be able to overcome them.
And that’s what I love about art in general, and film in particular. Sometimes you are just watching a film to see entrails exploding. And that’s great. I adore those experiences. But every so often, a character’s plight is so beautifully crafted to mirror your own, that it acts as a sort of catharsis, a healing process by which we’re able to make peace with our demons.
That was Eli’s final gift for this humble Oskar: to help me overcome, not the bullies of yesterday (Kung Fu had done that), but the demons of today. To be able to put to rest unspeakable horrors from my past, through the cleansing properties of celluloid. And if that’s not the magic of the movies, my friends, I don’t know what is.
Categorized:Editorials News
