UNITED KINGDOM: The young stars of "Let Me In" hit the red carpet in London for the film's UK Premiere
Record ID:
218981
UNITED KINGDOM: The young stars of "Let Me In" hit the red carpet in London for the film's UK Premiere
- Title: UNITED KINGDOM: The young stars of "Let Me In" hit the red carpet in London for the film's UK Premiere
- Date: 15th October 2010
- Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (OCTOBER 14, 2010) (REUTERS) MORTEZ TALKING TO MEDIA (SOUNDBITE) (English) CHLOE MORTEZ, SAYING: "Here's a story so I left at about 6.45 and we rushed over here doing the make-up in the car, changed in the car, had 1930's hair in the car, and I magically show up like this." WIDE OF RED CARPET
- Embargoed: 30th October 2010 13:00
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- Reuters ID: LVA7HJHT2GN25NCKXE7U9OJYE5I1
- Story Text: Director Matt Reeves of "Cloverfield" joined the young stars of horror remake "Let Me In" on the red carpet in London for the film's UK Premiere on Thursday (October 14).
A remake of the 2008 Swedish hit, "Let the Right One In", the film is set against the new backdrop of New Mexico in the 1980s.
The film sees Kodi Smit-McPhee, seen in last year's "The Road", as Owen a lonely twelve year old outsider living a sad live with his distant mother and bullied by kids at school. That is until Abby (Chloe Moretz, best known as the controversial, foul-mouthed Hit-Girl in action flick "Kick-Ass") moves in with her "father" played by Academy Award nominee Kevin Jenkins. The new neighbour shows real empathy for Owen and a friendship develops between the two.
Abby encourages him to stand-up for himself and fight back, but at the same time, is initially traumatised when he finds out his only friend in the world turns out to be an insatiable vampire.
The film marks the return of the Hammer Film Production, famous for it's catalogue of horror films during the 70's - particularly the iconic Dracula series featuring Christopher Lee. It is the first movie Hammer has released in more than 30 years Director Matt Reeves, who helmed the reality sci-fi/horror, 'Cloverfield', knew the production would have to prove itself to the loyal global fan base of the original critically acclaimed film.
"When all the fans realised we were doing I sort of thought, 'Oh my gosh, we're in big trouble now because maybe they'll never even give us a chance.' But I understood it because I felt like most remakes are essentially crap. I mean they're terrible. So I think maybe there was a thought that we were making a soulless retread but you know we loved this story and we tried to do our own version of it but be very faithful to it at the same time and the fact that people seem to be responding to it is fantastic," he said on the red carpet ahead of the premiere.
He added that, personally, the most satisfying response to the film came from John Lindqvist, who wrote the novel that the movie is based on, as well as the screenplay for the first Swedish film adaptation.
"To me the greatest thing was I was really really worried about Lindqvist and what he would think and he actually saw it here, in London, just about two weeks ago or maybe a week ago, I forget-- actually just before the October 2 opening in the US and he loved the movie and he wrote this very very kind e-mail and that was probably the most exciting thing that's happened to me in terms of reactions," he told Reuters Television.
Reeves was also lucky enough receive some tips from a legend of film-making - and a director used to working with child actors - Steven Spielberg.
"The key piece of advice he gave was: 'You are trying to make a movie about twelve year olds, you're trying to remember what it's like to be twelve years old, they are twelve.' So really let them come up with ideas and be really open to what they could suggest because really you want a kid's-eye point of view, they'll have it," Reeves recalled.
Both of the film's young actors said they avoided seeing the original film beforehand to avoid it getting in the way of their performance.
"Yeah, because I didn't really want it in my head and actually kind of feel sorry for Matt because he watched it and it would have been stuck in his head and he had to forget about it," said Kodi Smit-Mcphee.
Mortez and Smit-McPhee also had limited rehearsal time together before shooting so that they got to know each other off-screen at the same time as their characters on-screen.
"Yeah, we actually, my dad and I chose not to have too much because then when you go on set you actually know each other about anything and yeah it actually did help," Smit-McPhee said.
Mortez agreed that it helped for a more genuine performance - which also resulted in a genuine friendship beyond the film.
"Yeah, definitely. We met each other for the first two weeks and we just became best friends then, so it was kind like from the head start we were best friends . But we kind of evolved into better friends as shooting became longer," she said.
Like her co-star, Mortez's star is fast rising in Hollywood, with her role as Abby in "Let Me In" making her second feature role this year after playing Hit Girl in the successful comic adaptation, "Kick-Ass"
On the night of the premiere she had literally rushed to the red carpet from shooting Martin Scorcese's upcoming 1930's fantasy "Hugo Cabret".
"Here's a story so I left at about 6.45 and we rushed over here doing the make-up in the car, changed in the car, had 1930's hair in the car, and I magically show up like this," she said.
"Let Me In" opens across UK cinemas on November 5. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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