The U.S. remake to Tomas Alfredson’s critical darling Let The Right One In has been cast.  While Alfredson himself has moved on to The Danish Girl with Nicole Kidman, Matt Reeves’ redo of his film will see Oscar-nominee Richard Jenkins (The Visitor), Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Road), and Chloe Moretz (500 Days of Summer) act out the necessary parts.  Coming off of Cloverfield, Reeves will have Smit-McPhee and Moretz in the roles of Owen and Abby, with Jenkins as the adult known as Hakan in the original film.  Live For Films says the film is:

Based on the bestselling Swedish novel, Lat den Ratte Komma In, by Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist, Let Me In is a contemporary vampire tale about a young boy who befriends a girl new to his neighborhood. The film is a remake of the highly acclaimed Swedish film, Lat den Ratte Komma In, also known as, Let the Right One In.

I don’t know enough about the original or the cast members, save for Jenkins, to have a strong take on the casting.  Reeves though, calls it his “dream cast,” and I don’t think he was referring to the defunct Sega gaming console.   The movie is scheduled to start shooting next month, with Overture Films hoping for a fast track release next year.  I still have yet to see the original as I typically steer clear of horror, even though it was reviewed so well in general. It is in my Netflix queue (where films go to die), but I will in all likelihood catch it before the remake hits.  Any thoughts on the casting are more than welcome.  Peace.

Story written by The Film Nest guest contributor Chase Kahn (see him in the Comments section).

44 year-old Swedish director Tomas Alfredson will direct the upcoming sex-change drama, The Danish Girl, starring Nicole Kidman, according to Variety. The film is an adaptation of the David Ebershoff novel about real-life Danish painter Einar Wegener (Kidman) who became the first person to undergo a sex-change operation to become a woman in 1931.

Charlize Theron, who was originally tapped to star as Einar’s wife, has left the production, while Lucinda Coxon wrote the adapted screenplay.

The Danish Girl is definitely a step towards the spotlight for Alfredson, who broke through last year when his Swedish-language vampire film, an adaptation of the John Ajvide Lindqvist novel, Let the Right One In, was a major critical success. So much in fact, that Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) is currently helming an English-language remake, titled Let Me In. Although the director swears it’s another adaptation of the source novel, not a remake of the Alfredson film.

It will be interesting to see what they do with Kidman’s look before her sex-change operation, as well as afterwards. It seems like it would be much easier to cast a man as Einar Wegener, but such is the challenge of a role like this that usually brings great rewards if the actress can pull it off.  Don’t you think? The Danish Girl will tentatively release sometime in 2010.