The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, is based on the first in the Millennium series of novels, which is the third most popular thing to come out of Sweden (after Abba and Volvos). Having received rave reviews from critics around the globe, it's now being adapted for the English language market by David Fincher. And you can see why he's interested because, yes, Dragon Tattoo is about serial killers.
A renowned, old style, provocative journalist is hired by by an aging family member of one of Sweden's biggest corporations to solve the murder of his niece, who disappeared decades earlier. We also meet Lisbeth, an incredibly smart yet anti-social security firm employee, who's been hired to shadow Blomkvist, finding out all she can about him. However it's not long before they've teamed up to solve the crime.
What is essentially an old fashioned, cinematic version of Cold Case, is livened up by a stellar performance and a script which disturbingly explores Sweden's dark side (neo-Nazis/corporate bullying), along with an over-arching theme of 'brutality towards women'. This is seen through the murder investigation itself, but most strikingly through the eyes of Lisbeth, whose past and present encounters with men have left her cold and rebellious, but also strong and resilient.
As a entry into the murder/mystery genre it's good but not great. As a character study of two distinctly opposed souls who are united with their obsession in uncovering the truth, it's definitely a cut above. So much so it feels completely pointless in Fincher remaking it. Still, if I'd said that about Insomnia we wouldn't have got Christopher Nolan's masterful remake. Bring it on Fincher!
1 comment:
I thought TGWTDT was very good but far from the classic many people were saying. But where it does score highly is in the dark, disturbing and uncompromising themes it explores and in the character of Lisbeth Salander and the great performance from Noomi Rapace who plays her. That alone makes me wanna see the other two movies.
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