Let Me In

I hate it when Hollywood remakes good foreign films. For the uninitiated, Let Me In is a remake of Let The Right One In, a Swedish film based upon a Swedish novel. All I can say is that Matt Reeves does a fucking brilliant job at crafting a haunting vampire love story. Let Me In holds its on and is just as good, maybe better than the original.

In a nutshell: Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is a frail 12 year old boy and generally an outcast who is constantly bullied by Kenny and his gang. One day, he spots an old man and a girl about his age move into the apartment unit next to his. The girl is Abby (Chloe Moretz) who to Owen looks to be a weird and mysterious girl. What he doesn't know is that Abby is a vampire who offers a new leap in Owen's life.

I've noticed that a lot of Malaysian's have complained about the film's lack of scare elements and contribute that the film is a bore and offers nothing in the horror genre. Horror doesn't have to be scary, it can mean a lot of other things as well. Let Me In had a thoroughly haunting presence, complimented by an awesome music score, subtle dialogue and the sleepy town itself.

Both Kodi and Chloe play their parts with absolute professionalism and bode a natural chemistry between the two on the screen. You can actually believe there is a bond between Owen and Abby because it is just that good. However, in comparision with the original Swedish version, Lina Leandersson beats Chloe's performance by a slim mile. Let Me In is more violent than the original, the feel of such is produced by Reeves method of making Abby more volatile when it came to making the kill as compared to Alfredson's style of making Eli more subtle in her kill.

My main complaint would be Reeves slight change in the storyline by eliminating the Lacke/Virginia subplot as I thought it made the confrontation between Eli and Lacke more profound and emotionally effective as compared with the unnamed Police Detective and Abby. I was also hopping for a more prevalent relationship connection between "The Father" and Abby in Let Me In but I can understand Reeve's decision to cut out those subplots in favour of concentrating more on Abby and Owen.

Props to make up for when Abby's in her vampire mode. Definately unsettling to see Chloe who is normally adorable in a shroud of true horror.

On a super plus side the vampire mythology is back to its basics with sunlight actually killing vampires as opposed to 'you know what'. This is how vampires are supposed to be. They're not emo and certainly not glamorous. They're tortured creatures of the night that beg to be released from their curse and true monsters that won't think twice about ripping out your throat.

Closing verdict: One of the best films of the year

9/10