Let Me In earns twin scores of 100 from the trades

With only 4 reviews on the board, it’s way early to say Let Me In has effectively squelched the naysayers, but it’s rare enough for Variety and The Hollywood Reporter to weigh in with matching raves to warrant a mention.

VARIETY: Fans of “Let the Right One In” can relax. “Cloverfield” director Matt Reeves hasn’t ruined the elegant Swedish vampire story by remaking it. If anything, he’s made some improvements, including the addition of a tense action-horror sequence in the middle of the film… Reeves, who also wrote the script for “Let Me In,” seems to favor the more resonant notion of an endless cycle of tortured romance, one that takes its toll on Abby’s partners by demanding that they become serial killers. Perhaps the difference in titles is significant: Whereas the vampire girl finally met her soulmate (“the right one”) in the original, here, she is caught in a sad, endless cycle.

THR: While he faithfully recreates a number of sequences and shifts the positions of others, Reeves also incorporates some new stuff that, for the most part, heightens rather than diminishes the original’s understated intensity… Key to the remake’s ultimate success is the casting of the troubled young leads.Smit-McPhee and Moretz possess the soulful depth and pre-adolescent vulnerability necessary to keep it compellingly real.