Let Me In Director Matt Reeves on Fan Grudges, Culture Club and Keeping the Secret of His Coolest Shot

Matt Reeves knew he was going to take some heat for this week's new Let Me In, the English-language adaptation of the beloved Swedish vampire-youth novel Let the Right One In -- a celebrated screen version of which had already been exported to America in 2008. He anticipated an uphill battle with the original film's rabid fan base, in which a denouncement from director Tomas Alfredson wouldn't particularly help matters. But judging by his results (and their response to date), it's safe to say cooler heads prevailed. Movieline spoke to Reeves this morning about the early discord, the period flavor that helps define his film (count 'em, two Culture Club songs) and, yes, the possibility of a much ballyhooed Cloverfield sequel.

I really enjoyed Let the Right One In, but I didn't realize that it was blasphemy to remake it...

Well, I didn't know it was blasphemy until the [original] movie came out. I started this before the movie was released. I was approached and I actually got in touch with John Lindqvist who wrote the novel and wrote the screenplay for the film. And he actually was very supportive of us doing it, in fact, too. He said, "I was excited when I heard that you were involved because I really like Cloverfield. And I thought it was a really fresh spin on an old story, and that's what we're trying to do with Let the Right One In." For him, the book and the Swedish film were sort of versions of his childhood. Initially, when they first showed me the film, I said, "I think this movie is so good, I don't think you should remake it." Number one, I didn't necessarily want to make a remake at all, anyway, of anything. Number two, this particular project, I didn't want to to do because I thought it was so good. But I fell in love with that coming-of-age story. In a weird way it related to some of what I had written, except I hadn't had the brilliance that Lindqvist had: Which was to turn a vampire story into a coming-of-age story and use it as a metaphor. But certainly once it came out, the Swedish film, once it came out in October of 2008, [mine] was immediately denounced as blasphemy.

Tomas Alfredson wasn't happy.

He wasn't happy. You know what? I can't say that I even blame him. No only do I not blame the fans... When somebody falls in love with something, they feel proprietary. They feel like it's theirs and they feel like it's their discovery and it's so precious. it shows how great the story is and how great that movie is. When Alfredson responded, initially, I didn't blame him because I thought, Well, his movie is just coming out. And I would not even have announced that we were doing it at that point because it was literally at the same moment the movie was coming out. It was like, "Oh, here's my movie and there's going to be another version of it shortly." So I completely don't blame him. I would have been sort of put off. I would love for him to see the movie at some point. I would love to meet him. To me, I haven't been put off by the fan reaction or by Alfredson's reaction; I understood it, especially when you consider how bad most remakes are. I wouldn't say regret, but there were certain moments, after we got through the first draft and the [original] movie came out and it got the kind of acclaim it did, I suddenly thought, What did I do? I thought, This is crazy.

I do feel that David Fincher owes you a thank-you note for you taking the brunt of the "remaking a Swedish movie" outrage.

[Laughs] Now he wont have any problem when he's making The Girl with the Dragoon Tattoo.

I think the book and the original film are set in 1982, but yours is set in 1983...

I don't remember exactly the year, I know around when the book is set. I know that I chose 1983...

Well, I have a theory.

Go ahead, tell me.

You wanted to be able to include two Culture Club songs playing in the background.

[Laughs and claps his hands] I love that! Um, no...

Dammit.

But I did want to get those songs in. But that is very funny. You know, let's just go with that. To be honest with you, the first two that we had in there were "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me" and "Karma Chameleon"

"Karma Chameleon" came out in 1984, I believe.

I don't think so. Because every song that we used, I was very careful to make sure that it came out in the period that it was supposed to be in, so I don't know. Maybe that's when it was released as a single? But the album was definitely out.

Right, Colour by Numbers. The two in the film are on Kissing to be Clever.

That was something I wanted to do, but I couldn't get the right to it. It's too expensive. Then they gave me a list I was like, "Wait a minute, I can get "Time (Clock of the Heart)"? That song is amazing." For people who like Culture Club, it's a great song -- it's a beautiful song -- but it's not a song that, apparently, commands as much money.

[Nerd Alert: For the record, the album Colour by Numbers was released in October of 1983. The single "Karma Chameleon," in the U.S., was number one in February of 1984.]

And those songs play while Abby and Owen are playing Ms. Pac-Man and Gorf. Did you have to turn Gorf off? If I remember, that game just constantly barks out "Gorf, Gorf."

We actually did. None of the game sounds are actually playing from the location. I don't think we got the sounds for Gorf cleared. We got the machine cleared, but we didn't get the sounds cleared. We tried to get as much as the game sounds, like the Ms. Pac-Man, but they actually have to be cleared. But I don't think we had the Gorf saying "Gorf," unfortunately.

Then, as the movie gets more intense, we hear The Greg Kihn Band and Blue Oyster Cult.

You know, we originally had some different songs in there, too. Because of the money, we really couldn't afford some. Originally, Jenkins was attacking the kid to Asia's "Heat of the Moment," which was really fun. It was great, but, you know what? "Burnin' For You" is awesome, too. The other one by the Greg Kihn Band -- that, in the script, was The Romantics "What I Like About You," which was really fun. But when we put in The Greg Kihn Band, it was much better.

"The Breakup Song" is criminally underused.

And Kodi, in that scene, thinks he's a little cooler than he is. Because that song has a little attitude, the "ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah," which is awesome. Even though I didn't get my first choice on maybe half of them, I ended up being just about as happy with all of them. In fact, in some cases, happier.

I've heard you say that you were asked to change the ages of the characters. Did they want more of the bare-chested hunk vampires we've seen of late?

I don't know if we actually ever discussed "bare-chested hunk," but I'm sure there was a thought, somewhere. There was a thought that aging it up may make it more acceptable to an American audience. A great thing happened: Twilight came out. And when Twilight came out it, silenced that. A lot of people say, "Oh, were you trying to copy Twilight?" Twilight hadn't come out. So it wasn't people saying, "It has to be like Twilight." When Twilight came out, everyone who had been saying, "you should age them up" stopped saying it because they realized that we would never be able to differentiate ourselves if we didn't keep them younger.

My favorite scene is the car wreck scene. How was that filmed?

Something was done special to shoot it, but I'm not going to say, just yet. Only because the movie is just coming out and I want people to see it first. But I'm going to explain in detail how we did it. We'll do a thing on the DVD. After the movie's been out for a couple of weeks and people have seen it, I will be happy to talk about that.

You do feel like you're actually in the car.

That was the idea, yeah. You are in the car! You are absolutely in the car, I can tell you that. I really love point-of-view driven movies; movies that put you in the shoes of people and situations that you're going to feel the kind of horror that they go through. But, also, even in terms of the emotional stuff, I want you to relate to these characters by putting you in their shoes. I was really inspired by a ton of Hitchcockian classics. A suspense narrative where you construct things in intimate close-ups that then relate to shots of what they're seeing. That shot, in particular, I really waned you to go through the experience of the accident that Jenkins has.

You mentioned Cloverfield earlier. I've seen you use the phrase "spikes of activity" when discussing a sequel.

You know what, I said that once and it got quoted five million times. That's what happened. No, you know what, I'll say this: There have been no spikes in activity. There's no news. The thing is that J.J. is making Super 8, I just finished this and Drew [Goddard] is actually working on a script for a Spielberg movie and he just finished directing his first movie called Cabin in the Woods, which he wrote with Joss Whedon. So none of us have had time to work on anything but those things. Except for J.J., of course, who can work on 30 things because he's amazing. But we really haven't had the time yet. I think if we find the right thing, we will do it. But if we don't, we won't.

I don't want this to sound like I don't like Cloverfield...

Why do you hate Cloverfield?!

Cloverfield may be my favorite movie, before it was released. The speculation was fun, people thought it was Voltron at one point.

I know. That was crazy. I remember in the trailer, I'm the voice saying, "Oh my God, it's alive. It's huge!" That's how the Voltron thing started. I guess I speak too quickly and people were like, "He's saying 'It's a lion! It's huge!'" A lion? Voltron! This is amazing. And I was like, "No, I was just saying that it was alive." But, apparently, too rapidly.