I finally got to watch Let Me In on DVD during the week. This was a movie I was really looking forward to seeing after reading the novel Let the Right One In and watching the original Swedish adaptation at the end of 2010 .
I should say right from the start that I love the novel. You can read my thoughts on it on my "book blog" at http://bookswhatilike.blogspot.com/2010/11/let-right-one-in-by-john-ajvide.html
I was naturally curious as to what the hammer-produced American version would be like. Would they have ripped the soul out of the tale and released a trashy remake? Thankfully not. The new version is remarkably close to the story told in the book and the other movie. All the main plot developments are here. The action may have moved from Blackburg to Los Alamos in New Mexico but this is essentially the same story with the same characters.
Kodi Smit-McPhee and Chloe Grace Moretz are perfect in their roles as twelve-year-old Owen and vampire Abby, also twelve, but she's been twelve "for a long time". Their loneliness and burgeoning friendship is perfectly captured. Atmospherically the move feels a lot more "real" than what normally gets labeled as a horror movie. The characters are completely believable and, as in the novel, I couldn't help but feel sympathy for each and every one of them. Even when the "father" is trying to kill people for their blood he's doing it out of love for Abby.
There are a few changes. For example there is a new scene set in a car with the "father" lying in wait for a victim, but it's very effective and tense.
There's another little moment that is new that essentially changes the back-story of how the "father" and Abby meet. At one point Owen finds photo-booth style photographs of Abby and a young boy with glasses. The implication is that Abby met the "father" when he was about the same age as Owen and suggests that Owen will take over the roll of "father".
As with the earlier movie the last shot is of Owen on a train with a large trunk, tapping out some Morse code. It manages to be chilling and hopeful at the same time.
In summary an excellent movie.
