Matt Reeve’s ‘Let Me In’ is based on John Ajvide Lindqvist’s best-selling Swedish novel ‘Låt den Rätte Komma In’ (Let The Right One In) and the 2009 film of the same title. It is a vampire story but this is more than a typical horror movie; Kodi Smit-McPhee (who plays Owen) told End of Show that ‘Let Me In’ is predominantly “a story about growing up”.

Owen is a lonely young boy who lives in a sleepy town in New Mexico with his overbearing yet absent mother (played by Cara Buono who remains faceless throughout the film). His parents are going through a messy divorce and he is the victim of bullying at school and the only place he finds solace is in the snowy courtyard behind his apartment block. It is here that he comes across the mysterious Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz) whom he assumes to be the daughter of his creepy new neighbour (played by Richard Jenkins).

Lovers of the Swedish original will immediately recognise the different and more dramatic opening of this version. The dull camera filter, the suspenseful angles and Michael Giacchino’s hard-hitting and eerie score invites you into a Hammer Films horror, the first to be produced by the studio in over 30 years. The film opens with a wide panning shot of an intensely dark and snowy long road, the silence punctuated by the sound of sirens. In the back of an ambulance, a disfigured man has been handcuffed to his stretcher and upon his arrival to hospital is questioned by a policeman (played by Elias Koteas) about his identity. As he is unable to talk, he begins to write a note which reads “I’m sorry Abby”, a defining point at which the story rewinds to two weeks earlier.

There are three minds which we enter when watching this story unfold. One is of the lonely and desperate Owen, the other is of Abby, the tortured and childlike vampire and the last is of Abby’s guardian for whom we are given no back-story, but who slowly reveals his conflicted toil between the regret and necessity involved in his “fatherly duties” which involve collecting blood for Abby.

The suspense surrounding the murders he commits creates a thrilling jump-out-of-your-seat atmosphere and although Reeves has adapted some of these away from the Swedish version, his vision proves to be just as imaginative and sinister. Coming home empty handed, Abby’s guardian is faced with a monster-like scream from Abby who asks if she has to do everything herself. In the scene that follows, we see the cute and childlike Abby transform into a cold-blooded killer. The noise and movement that surround this occurrence can only be described as banshee-like shrieking with an overdose of CGI. The beauty of this story is in its subtlety and the overt gruesomeness that this version insists upon threatens to overlook this understated element.

When Abby and Owen meet, Abby declares to Owen that they “can’t be friends” which followed by Abby’s response to her age, “12, more or less” should have been a telling clue that this girl was different. The two eventually form an intimate friendship in which Abby’s true identity is slowly revealed.

Smit-McPhee’s portrayal of the forlorn and conflicted Owen is so believable that it is haunting. Although a huge fan of Moretz, her performance as Abby lacked the tortured magnetism that her Swedish counterpart exuded. However, this may have been because her character was portrayed in a more childlike way than in the former screenplay.

The charming chemistry between the two leads mirrors the dynamic between the characters of Owen and Abby perfectly. Minus the unnecessary digital add-ins, this is a good attempt at a remake of a modern vampire cult-classic.