Love it or loathe it, the next few months will be rife with unsurprising, noisy, one-note movies at a time when counter-programming is becoming essential. This week, two blessedly left field entries try to gain some traction with moviegoers: Let the Right One In is a refreshing tonic to both summer action and the ubiquitous vampire trend. The Crazies is a remake of a middling 1973 entry from horror icon George Romero (Night of the Living Dead). For the most part both get the job done, and as much as I love Robert Downey Jr, both are a welcome break from big budget glitz and gloss.

Based on the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist (the Swedish Stephen King), Let the Right One In is as obliquely Scandinavian as it is truly clever-without being completely revisionist in its vampire lore. Perpetually bullied 12-year-old Oskar (Kare Hedebrant) meets Eli (Lina Leandersson) one night at the apartment playground as he ponders the meaning of his miserable life. Sure, she's oblivious to the cold but she relates to Oskar as an equal and a friend. She's also a vampire, and a recent series of gruesome murders in the provincial town may have something to do with her.

LTROI has been kicking around for a few years now (and it's being remade), but it's best appreciated on the big screen. Making it spare and serene, director Tomas Alfredson has basically spun an undead coming-of-age tale. In a classic example of film school mise-en-scene, Alfredson visualizes Oskar's outcast status with meticulous framing, realizing Eli's draw for Oskar elegantly. Adults are nearly non-existent in Oskar and Eli's world, and it is Eli that helps Oskar find his inner strength (albeit bloodily) and act out his revenge fantasies. The two are outcasts with penchants for violence, be it by choice or necessity, and it's what connects them as friends. It's a precarious foundation for bonding, and Alfredson never quite manages to navigate Oskar's dilemma in a way that makes his personal bloodlust palatable.

Whereas Oskar's struggle is an internal one, the characters in The Crazies have bigger fish to fry. After a series of random and violent murders, the blue-collar hamlet of Ogden Marsh finds itself in lockdown, with former friends and neighbors at each other's throats as they morph into homicidal maniacs. As the violence escalates, Sheriff Dutton (Timothy Olyphant) tries to work out whether a nearby plane wreck has something to do with the madness infecting his town while an overbearing military machine breathes down his neck.

Like director Breck Eisner's ridiculous Sahara, The Crazies has absolutely nothing to say-unlike most of Romero's films or Let the Right One In. But that's not to say its impeccable pacing, bow-taut tension and old-school production are without merit. You can do conventional genre if you understand formula basics and do them this well. Eisner et al breeze through the story's foundations-we meet the major players (football star, mayor, diner denizens, etc,) and then move directly on to the zombie apocalypse action. It's almost as if Eisner knows we know what to expect and doesn't insult our intelligence by trying to be innovative.

Eisner does his part to keep the rag-tag band of survivors compelling; it's easy to care about the characters when Olyphant (Deadwood, Justified), who's quickly becoming Hollywood's go-to guy for all its modern cowboy needs, and Radha Mitchell (who earned a lifetime's worth of genre cred for Pitch Black) as Mrs. Dutton are leading the band around the requisite burning cars and abandoned streets. The shocker ending is a throwback to a more paranoid decade, but serves as a reminder that the basics are The Basics for a reason: They still work.

Let the Right One In and The Crazies opened in Hong Kong Thursday.

Let the Right One In

Directed by Tomas Alfredson, written by John Ajvide Lindqvist, based on his novel. Starring Kare Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson, and Per Ragnar. Sweden, 113 minutes, IIB.

The Crazies

Directed by Breck Eisner, written by Scott Kosar and Ray Wright. Starring Timothy Olyphant, Radha Mitchell, and Joe Anderson. USA, 100 minutes, IIB.

(HK Edition 05/08/2010 page2)