Not by the hair of my chiny, chin, chin
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
You're a 12-year-old living in the mid-eighties, unhappy and lonely. Neglected by your divorcing parents and harassed by cruel bullies at school, life pretty much sucks. That is, until you spy the new girl moving into your apartment complex. She's pretty and interested in you and your Rubik's Cube. Sure, she doesn't wear shoes to walk across the snow-covered ground and is reluctant to develop a close friendship at first, but you overlook that. It's a little harder to dismiss her tendency to drain the townsfolk of their blood and rip the local law enforcement's throat out. Oh yeah, forgot to mention she's a bloodsucking vampire in the body of a 12-year-old girl.
This is the premise for Let Me In, the American remake of Swedish cult masterpiece Let The Right One In. Based on the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist, Australian actor Kodi Smit-McPhee plays our protagonist Owen and Chloe Mortez is his fangy female friend Abby. Directed by Matt Reeves (Cloverfield, The Yards), Let Me In is a rarity - an American remake of an extraordinary foreign film that isn't blasphemous. Sure, the Swedish subtleties are swapped for blonde-haired and blue-eyed Americanisms, but as a whole the film is a slow, creepy example of modern horror at its best. 
Innocence and evil are contrasted beautifully in the endless snow-filled exteriors, often splashed with arterial red blood. Reeves hasn't deviated too far from the original, adding an extra bonding scene here or a warmer colour palette there, but the biggest difference is the paedophilia and gender themes written out altogether. Which is probably a good thing, given there isn't sufficient time to explore it in the film (like there was in the book) and a superficial take will only leave you slightly baffled like the Swedish version.
The two young leads, Smit-McPhee and Mortez, are extraordinary, the latter proving she can be soft and alluring as well as brutal and full of attitude like her role as Hit Girl in Kick Ass. After star-making turns in The Road and Matching Jack, Smit-McPhee is undoubtedly the male child actor of his generation. His portrayal of Owen is beyond endearing; you actually feel for this sensitive and different child. He wins you over by doing something as small as singing an advertising jingle in his sweet alto, to embracing blood-soaked Abby after she reveals what happens when she's `uninvited'. 
Looking at the big picture, Let Me In is a huge horror achievement but as your watching it everything is understated. The suspense, terror, dread and gore are all slow-building and unlike so many contemporary genre films, it doesn't overdo any of the key elements. Let Me In takes the original vampire mythos, a bloodsucking male preying on the blood of young women, and literally flips it on its head. Reeves proved with Cloverfield that he can make a big, flashy blockbuster when he wants to and it's fantastic to see this upcoming filmmaker is just as capable of handling more muted and intelligent material.
Let Me In is available to rent or buy on DVD now.
