The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

After the announcement that The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was getting an English-language film treatment, I decided that the hype had built up to a point where I just had to read the source material for myself. Though it is not without flaws, Dragon Tattoo is an excellent story with the important mission of raising awareness concerning violence against women. Mere days after finishing the book I watched the Swedish film. The hype train had me excited for an outstanding thriller.

The hype train let me down.

I was left cold and somewhat irritated by the Swedish adaptation. A ton of important plot elements were left out, some were inexplicably added (Blomkvist's memories of the island became far too important and contrived), and Rapace felt all wrong as Lisbeth. She was brilliant and violent, but lacked the quiet pensiveness of the original character. She did not come off as autistic and emotionally disturbed, just bratty and rude. Worst of all, I was constantly confused by the extremely rushed, strange new take on the story.

As a lover of foreign films, I normally grind my teeth when I hear that America is developing a remake. However, I found myself desperate for this one. I needed a movie that actually gave me the experience of reading the book for the first time, that made me care for Lisbeth and that truly disturbed me. Thankfully, the American adaptation (not a remake) delivered exactly what I was looking for. Those who say this version is unnecessary or a rehash must have seen a very different Swedish Girl with the Dragon Tattoo than I saw. The American take is jam-packed with scenes that were either skimmed or completely left out of the Swedish version. Yet, despite being more robust, the English- language Dragon Tattoo is incredibly paced, feeling less rushed yet hitting all the important plot points. The characters have time to develop and grow on you, the clue-finding makes more sense, and the killer is more horrifying. Screenwriter Zaillian knows exactly what to leave out and what to change (though the ending, which mirrors the book's ending, could have been arranged better). Craig, Mara, and even Plummer are spot-on in their roles and feel more fleshed-out as characters. Mara, in particular, inhabits Larsson's Lisbeth in a way Rapace did not. She captures Lisbeth's silent, borderline-autistic nature perfectly. Her fragile body and alien appearance even match the book's description. She allows herself to be vulnerable, but clearly regrets it over time. It's a captivating performance.

If someone were to ask me, personally, which version to see, I would have to say without hesitation that this is the rare occasion where the American adaptation is superior. I did not think it was possible to stay so true to the story under three hours.

I was really looking forward to The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo ever since I learned that David Fincher had been attached to it. Now normally I'd be angry at the fact of a foreign film being remade, having seen and loved the Swedish version of the film, but I made an exception with this one because of the cast and crew for this film. Fincher, who directed films such as Fight Club, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button, and most recently The Social Network (my favorite film of 2010 and what I thought should have won over The King's Speech), has a fantastic eye for filmmaking and has always impressed me with his movies, save for Se7en which I wasn't as huge a fan of as everyone else was and even on that film I enjoyed a good bit. You throw in the writer of Schindler's List and Gangs Of New York, add actors like Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara, Christopher Plummer and so many others, a score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (who also scored The Social Network), and base it off the best selling book by Stieg Larsson (that's right, this isn't a remake but rather a re-adaptation), it all equals out to, in my opinion, the best film of the year by far.

Now the first thing I want to say about this movie is Rooney Mara's performance. She knocks it out of the park portraying Lisbeth Salander. She captured the mystery, the strangeness, the darkness, the out-of-the- norm personality that this character had. She was absolutely fantastic and I'm gonna be shocked as hell if she does not get an Oscar nomination. And she really makes you feel for her in the darker parts of this movie, which we'll get to in a moment. And all the other performances are great as well. Daniel Craig is great as usual and there is great chemistry between him and Mara. Christopher Plummer, as little as he's in the movie, does a great job as well, in fact all the actors do. This is a really well acted movie.

Another thing that a lot of people have been talking about with this film, as it was with the book and the Swedish film, was the moments where sexual violence appears on screen. And while there are some really uncomfortable moments in the film, that's the reason why these scenes succeed. They shock you and make you want to look away. And that's good, especially when the themes of this movie as well as the source material were about this sort of thing, and the movie conveys it perfectly. And while these scenes do linger in your mind, they never distract you from the basis of this movie, which leads into my next praise for the film.

The story is really engaging. Even though I had seen the Swedish movie and knew how the story as a whole was going to play out, I was able to be really engaged in the movie and not focus on other things. It really sucks you in, and Steve Zaillian, the writer of this movie, structures the film in a way that is both similar and different to the Swedish version, therefore doing what I hoped this film would do, which was taking something that I already knew about and had watched before and made it to where it was still interesting and there were changes made to where I didn't know how it was going to turn out. And that's great.

And everything technical about this movie succeeds. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is fantastic and really sucks you into the tone of the picture. Jeff Cronenweth, who worked with Fincher on both Fight Club and The Social Network, delivers fantastic cinematography. The editing, the direction, the shots, everything about this movie succeeds, making it a near perfect film.

Now one small complaint I have about this film stems a little bit from me viewing the Swedish version, in which they reveal a little more about who Lisbeth is and one of the things she did in her past that made it so troubled. And they didn't use that here which kind of threw me off a little. However, the more I think about it, the less it becomes a concern because 1.) You can't compare the two films and 2.) there are bits and pieces shown in the films climax that shows that Lisbeth deep down does have a soul. So the movie manages to overcome that obstacle, and overall, I have nothing to say bad about it.

Overall, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a masterful film, it's one that you should definitely check out and I'll definitely be checking it out sometime soon. It's directed, written, and acted well, and succeeds in all that it sets out to do. You feel the emotion and darkness of the film, Rooney Mara blew me away with her performance (and that body, damn), and overall it lived up to my expectations. So out of ten, I got to be honest, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a 10. Go see this movie NOW.

Greetings again from the darkness. The character of Lisbeth Salander absolutely fascinates me. That's true whether we are discussing Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy novels, the Swedish film versions, or this latest film version from director David Fincher and a screenplay from Steve Zaillian. It's also true whether Lisbeth is played on screen by Noomi Rapace (Swedish films) or Rooney Mara. She is a brilliant character hiding in plain sight from a world that has fiercely mistreated her, and now misjudges and underestimates her. She is the oddest heroine I can recall ... and I can't get enough of her.

Let's start with the source material. Stieg Larsson's books are far from perfect, but addictive just the same. The first book (on which this film is based) is, at its core, a simple who-dunnit presented in a manner that is claustrophobic, paranoid and eerie. Moving on to this particular film, we find the director and screenplay holding the basic tone while making a few changes ... some minor, others more substantial. These changes may irk those fans who are a bit more loyal to the books, but Fincher surely wanted to offer more than a simple re-telling of the story.

Daniel Craig plays Mikael Blomkvist, the journalist hired to solve the 40 year old mystery of the disappearance/murder of Harriet Vanger, niece to Swedish millionaire Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer). To research, Blomkvist must dig into the Vanger's rotten family tree of Nazis, anti-Semites, sexual predators, anti-social fanatics, and a few just plain loony birds. You can imagine how excited this rich and once powerful family is to have someone uncovering long buried secrets. Circumstances allow for Lisbeth to assist Blomkvist in researching this.

Unlike many mysteries where assembling the clues is the most fun, the real heart of this story is the odd, somewhat uncomfortable developing relationship between Blomkvist and Lisbeth. This latest version allows this to develop relatively smoothly, but it nonetheless rattles our senses. We see the subtle changes in Lisbeth as she slowly opens up to the idea of a real friendship based on trust. Fear not mystery fans, the Vanger clan still provides more than enough juice to keep any film sleuth happy.

It's truly impossible to avoid comparisons between the two movie versions and the respective casts. It's quite obvious Mr. Fincher was working with a substantially greater budget than Niels Arden Opler had for the first Swedish film. While they are both enthralling, I actually lean a bit towards the rawer original. That takes nothing away from this latest version. Same with Noomi Rapace vs. Rooney Mara. Ms. Mara is excellent in her performance and I was fully satisfied, but Ms. Rapace brought a rougher edge to the role ... one that made it even tougher to crack that shell. The biggest difference in the casts is Daniel Craig against Michael Nyqvist. Mr. Craig is just a bit too cool for the role, while Nyqvist captured the insecurity and vulnerability that Larsson wrote about.

All of that is nit-picking. Both film versions are sterling entertainment and hopefully the Fincher version will bring the story to a much wider audience. I would encourage those that are interested to check out the Swedish version, as well as the Larsson books. Maybe that will explain my fascination with this creature known as Lisbeth Salander.

I liked both the Swedish version and the US version...I think both are great in their own right. Mara and Craig bring a very interesting chemistry to this version that I really enjoyed. The noir-esque feel of the film is really cool. The soundtrack is killer (Trent Reznor)! Worth a watch if you haven't seen it already

The lights dim, the movie begins with a brief prologue, and the zany and incredibly weird opening credits begin, set to a creepy cover of Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song." From the beginning, we are in for a wild ride as Stieg Larsson's incredibly popular novel "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is brought to life on screen.

Scorned journalist Mikael Blomkvist is called upon by Henrik Vanger, a very wealthy man, while writing a book. Vanger is in search of an answer to the disappearance of his niece, Harriet, which occurred over 40 years ago. He assumes that Harriet is dead, and that she was murdered. He looks to Mikael to investigate her disappearance and who killed her. Then Mikael gets assistance from Lisbeth Salander, a dangerous but intelligent 24 year-old punk who is an accomplished computer hacker and a great contribution to the solving of other crimes. Together, Mikael and Lisbeth go on a dark, eerie journey into a world of crime, Nazism, and corruption that will lead them to Harriet's assassin.

I walked into "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" with almost no knowledge of Larsson's novel or the Swedish film made a few years before David Fincher's version. The end result is ultimately an extremely satisfying, brutal, and complex thriller thanks to great direction by Fincher (known greatly for his work on "Seven," "The Game," and "The Social Network"), excellent writing, and an impeccably chosen cast.

After only a few years, the character of Lisbeth Salander has become an attention-grabbing heroine that is as iconic as Edward Cullen of the love-it-or-hate-it "Twilight" series. And we can understand why. After all the truly awful and hideous things that have plagued her life, Lisbeth doesn't take any crap from anybody. She may be angry, violent, overtly sexual, demanding, and perhaps a little crazy, but she is a genius at what she does, and has reasons for all of her actions, no matter how gruesome they may be.

The mystery surrounding the film is sophisticated and white-knuckling, adding to the intensity and mood of the story and its characters. We're not sure of who is Harriet's killer, or if Harriet is even dead, until the last half hour of the film, and when we do find out the twist, it leaves a stupendous impact.

After cementing his reputation in brutal crime thrillers, and surprising us with "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" and "The Social Network," David Fincher was the right man for the director's chair. Every film he makes, even a drama like "The Social Network," sets up a tone of genuine suspense, tension, and fear for the characters. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" isn't any different as Fincher adds his signature touch to the movie.

Of all of the people they could have chosen to play these roles, the casting director landed in a pot of gold. Daniel Craig does a wonderful job as Mikael, showing us that he can play characters other than James Bond. With the amount of screen time she has, Robin Wright is also very good as Blomkvist's business partner Erika Berger. Christopher Plummer and Stellan Skarsgård also turn in great performances as Henrik Vanger and Martin Vanger.

The person to really watch out for, however, is Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander. Getting her big break in the underrated remake of "A Nightmare on Elm Street" and later starring in Fincher's previous film "The Social Network" (giving a dynamite performance in the opening scene), Mara has sealed her future with many more promising and exciting roles because of her portrayal of Lisbeth. This is not an easy role to play, knowing that Mara is the second person to play the character. She must endure two shocking rape scenes and a torture sequence, and there is a hefty amount of nudity involved. Mara embodies Lisbeth, immediately bringing immense intimidation, danger, and fury every time she comes on to the screen. Her eyes are wide and emotionless, almost as if you can see right through her. And with everything that has happened to the character, we understand that Lisbeth has a right to be that way. She may be smart, but she is not interested in attraction or friendships with another human being. Overall, Mara gives a sensational, fearless, dedicated, and electrifying performance that guarantees an Oscar nod.

Being released during the cheery time of the holidays, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is not a feel-good film, by any means. It is a harsh, gritty, and rough cinema trip that answers the question of leaving the kids at home with the babysitter. Also, if you're squeamish, you will not like it. However, those who have read the book, and those who have not read it, should check it out. Even without having read Larsson's novel, I left the theater completely satisfied. It is a movie experience that you don't commonly get. Fincher has done it again. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is a must!