In a snow filled city suburb of Stockholm, in 1982, bullied 12-year-old Oskar feels all alone in the world until a mysterious young girl named Eli moves in next door, along with her middle-aged minder. Eli is a vampire, destined to live forever in the body of a 12-year-old girl. Eli forms an awkward friendship with Oskar as she tries to teach the Nordic lad to stick up for himself. Their relationship begins to strain, however, when Eli's minder suffers a mishap when trying to feed her and Eli is left to fend

for herself.

Let the Right One In is an atmospheric character drama that draws viewers in with a seemingly sweet, albeit off-kilter love story with a playful sense of humour. You could almost be forgiven for thinking that the relationship between this pint sized vampire and a bullied Nordic lad is quite sweet, in a slightly macabre way. It is only when you start to think about the big picture that the pieces start to fall into place and it becomes quite apparent that this is a rather sinister story. Let the Right One In is an engaging movie that is guaranteed to have you talking about it for days afterwards.

Trevor Reznik (Bale) has not slept, and barely eaten, in a year. His body has been reduced to an emaciated, waif-like figure and he, understandably, has trouble concentrating on anything. All this would be dangerous enough for anyone, but Trevor is a lathe operator in a machine shop and every day he steps in to work he is putting his life and limbs on the line as well as those of his co-workers. Trevor's situation gets worse when he starts to think that one of his co-workers may be stalking him and possibly threatening his life. At the height of desperation, Trevor turns to a damaged woman named Stevie (Jason Leigh) for solace but it may all be too little, too late.

The Machinist is a particularly effective thriller that plays with viewers' perceptions to the point they feel they are walking in the same dreamy state as its protagonist. Once it warps the viewer into a dream-like state it injects all manner of paranoia to the back of their minds, to the point you can feel the madness setting in but cannot do anything about it. Bale, who lost a staggering amount of weight to portray Reznik, puts in a magnificent performance that makes everything utterly believable. The Machinist is a haunting modern classic.