The Dinner: Chilled zaru soba Noodles with chicken and fresh spring rolls at Boom Noodle (Capitol Hill, 1121 E. Pike St.).
The Movie: Let Me In at AMC Pacific Place 11.
The Screenplate:
Let Me In is an American horror film that stars Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Road) as a timid 12-year-old going through the rough divorce of his parents in a wintry Los Alamos, New Mexico. Here he meets an abstruse yet beautiful young girl played by Chloe Moretz (Hit-Girl from Kick-Ass), who teaches him how to love, stand up for himself, and come to terms with the difficulties that life is all too eager to throw at us — going steady with someone who might possibly be evil incarnate being at the top of that list.Although this film was perfectly well-structured and served as a totally competent horror film, especially relative to its contemporaries, there was one question I couldn’t get out of my head throughout the entire film: Why? Why was this remake made? It wasn’t like Let Me In’s 2008 predecessor Let The Right One In was the most recognizable intellectual property (as noticibly humble box office returns suggest), or even a particularly sexy sounding one. Even with stunning boons in the Vampires-In-Deplorably-Dysfunctional-Relationships genre as of late, studios had to realize they weren’t going to get the Taylor Lautner demographic for what is, at least on paper, a tale about a sickly, centuries-old vampire who likes to hang around pre-pubescent boys a little too much.
Let Me In was barely even an attempt to get closer to the original novel, which is David Fincher’s primary excuse for the similar quick Swedish-to-American turnaround of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Director Matt Reeves insisted that this was the case, but even the most glowing reviews of the remake can’t help but compare it heavily to the original — and with good reason. The ending of Let Me In in particular is damn near a shot-for-shot recreation with different actors and even the films’ running times practically match up exactly.
Sure, it’s American, so that means everything has to be overexplained, sped up by 1.5x, put under more blur filters and loaded up with cheesy music cues that tell us what emotions to feel in any given scene. There’s a pretty well done car crash that wasn’t in the original, which was cool but superficial. Also, I guess in fear of American audiences not quite understanding that Chloe Moretz’s character was a vampire, I had to wince when she spontaneously transformed into the bad guy from Blade 2 whenever she had to feed. Besides all that, Let Me In just doesn’t diverge enough from it’s source material to provide any compelling reason for its own existence. Boom Noodle’s seating arrangement puts all patrons either in the same row or parallel to each other, steeped in the social nature of more traditional noodle houses. That combined with brown and green earth tones dominating Boom’s palette tethers the restaurant to the rich history of this manner of casual Japanese cuisine before you can even pick up your chopsticks.
Albino Maneki Neko sculptures, a legion of tea lights suspended from the ceiling and a strict Modernist commitment to the ninety-degree angle all provide the significant divergences from tradition that I’d yearned for in the theater. Even if you don’t appreciate the flavor of decor, you have to admit the restaurant earns its distinction.Boom Noodle’s cold soba noodles allowed for a kind of firmness you couldn’t get with their hot, soupy brethren. Plus there’s something so shamefully gratifying about a big pile of noodles being plopped down in front of you; unadorned chunks of fresh chicken further the presentation that basically dares you to shovel the meal into your mouth as quickly as possible.
Not having to worry about scalding the inside of my mouth (bonus!), I tore through the noodles and chicken in no time, pausing only for brisk drinks of water, quick dips into a forgivingly salty tentsuyu sauce and the occasional fresh roll invigorated with crisp vegetables, but perhaps just a little too chewy around the edges. It was a glorious binge for a pretty low price despite Boom’s dauntingly chic exterior.
Both this week’s restaurant and the film do cold very well. With Let Me In, exteriors smothered with snow make up the bulk of the film, creating an inhospitable frozen nightmare for our oft-bullied boy protagonist. When introduced to a blood-sucking creature of the night prone to violent attacks on strangers, even the slightest bit of warmth is welcomed by the mostly ignored kid, and therefore the audience. While Boom Noodle’s use of cold is far less alienating, it does similarly provide emphasis on little nuances to the noodle dish you might’ve missed if you were slurping them down in a frenzy.It’s just a shame that Let Me In couldn’t have taken a few more liberties with its source material. It’s obvious that director Matt Reeves had a deep respect for both the book and the Swedish film and this doting loyalty allowed him to make another suspenseful, touching film. Moretz and Smit-McPhee provide the same adorable yet morally precarious dynamic as the first that powers the movie’s entire momentum and the film’s setpieces are understated but provide everything you need to know about Let Me In’s insular world. Ultimately, it was perhaps a doomed undertaking to try to make an American version of a stunning piece of Swedish horror while America’s own current horror film situation is an unidentifiable mess of sequels and rehashes.
