Review: Let Me In (15) ****

Hollywood has an uncanny knack of turning the silk purses of world cinema into the tatty sows' ears of English language remakes. Look no further than the clumsy reimaginings of Bangkok Dangerous and Vanilla Sky.

So it comes as an exceedingly pleasant surprise that Let Me In remains faithful to dazzling Swedish coming of age story, Lat Den Ratte Komma In, while making enough alternations to the story structure to merit a new adaptation for audiences averse to subtitles.

Reeves relocates his version to 1983 New Mexico and an apartment complex where 12-year-old Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) lives with his mother (Cara Buono).

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Bullied mercilessly at school by classmate Kenny (Dylan Minnette) and sidekicks Mark (Jimmy Pinchak) and Donald (Nicolai Dorian), Owen harbours fantasies of stabbing his tormentors with a penknife and spies on the neighbours with his telescope.

Late one night, he watches with interest as a girl (Chloe Moretz) and her father (Richard Jenkins) move into the apartment next door.

The two children meet the following day and after the latest beating from Kenny draws blood, Abby tells Owen to hit back hard.

Let Me In charts the extraordinary friendship between a boy and a vampire against a backdrop of paranoia and social change in Reagan-era America.

Reeves achieves a melancholic mood through cinematographer Greig Fraser's chilly colour palette and the performances from Smit-McPhee and Moretz are simply stunning.

On general release

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