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Matt Reeves Talks 'Let The Right One In' Remake

by Jessica Barnes Jun 30th 2009 // 6:20PM

Filed under: Foreign Language, Horror, Casting, Deals, Scripts, Remakes and Sequels

As much as I enjoyed the shaky-cam mayhem of Cloverfield, I'm pretty bummed about the idea of Matt Reeves helming a remake of the 2008 vampire film, Let the Right One In. Even before the original film had hit theaters stateside, there were deals in place for Reeves to remake the film for U.S. audiences -- and that's what has me worried. Whenever something is remade for North America, what it usually means is that a little 'sanitation' is in order. For better or for worse, audiences tend to react badly to seeing children in a decidedly non-childlike way, and that's what made The Right One so memorable. But I guess I better get used to the idea, because Reeves recently told the L.A. Times that he's been scouting locations and that a second draft of the script has already been completed and now has the new title, Let Me In.

Let the Right One In was the story of Oskar, a young boy living in the suburbs of Sweden who begins a friendship with a vampire child named Eli who has moved in next door. For Reeves' remake, he's kept the time period in the 80's, but relocated the story to Regan-era Colorado. Most importantly, he's promised that he won't be making his Oskar and Eli any older in an attempt to appeal to the 'Twilight Crowd', and the success of his remake will all come down to who Reeves casts for his two leads. The director has already started working with Avy Kaufman to try and find the perfect cast, and luckily, Kaufman has experience when it comes to casting 'creepy kids', having been the casting director for The Sixth Sense and The Ice Storm.

After the jump: the original film's director and screenwriter give their two cents...
To give Reeves his due, even he knows the odds are stacked against him with fans, telling the Times, "There's definitely people who have a real bull's-eye on the film, and I can understand because of people's' love of the [original] film that there's this cynicism that I'll come in and trash it, when in fact I have nothing but respect for the film."

Even amongst the original film's writer and director, opinions are split on the idea of a remake; Tomas Alfredson (the director) was a little more on the pessimistic side when he told journalists, "Remakes should be made of movies that aren't very good, that gives you the chance to fix whatever has gone wrong." But, funnily enough, John Ajvide Lindqvist (the author of the book the film was based on), seems pretty pleased that Reeves will be adapting his book from scratch rather than just a straight remake of the Swedish flick.

So what do you think? Can Reeves do a remake without losing the original film's 'bite', and who would you like to see take on Oskar and Eli? Sound off below...

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Tags: cloverfield, foreign, let the right one in, LetTheRightOneIn, matt reeves, MattReeves, remake, vampire, vampires

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