The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Review by Anthony Morris
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The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
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Getting David Fincher (Seven, Fight Club) to direct the US version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo seemed like a great idea at the time and so it's proven to be; the problem is that he’s still directing a movie version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
Okay,
that’s a little glib, and his version does have some other problems
with it – for one, its version of Lisbeth Salander (played well by
Rooney Mara) is less of a force of nature and more open to love, which
defeats the purpose somewhat – but there's little avoiding the fact
that this film's biggest problem lies with the source material. The
story hasn't been messed around with in any substantial way, so for
well over an hour (out of a two and a half hour run time) we’re
watching two completely stories as doughy journalist Mikael Blomkvist
(Daniel Craig) deals with a personal scandal by taking a job looking
for a girl who vanished decades ago while Lisbeth is raped by her
social worker then takes graphic revenge. Eventually the two stories
merge and the pace picks up but this is still the story of two people
spending a lot of time staring into computer screens and rummaging
through libraries. If anyone could make this work yet again (the films
made from the Swedish television adaptations having shown here only a
few years ago) it’s Fincher and many of the individual scenes are
atmospheric and engaging. But having one fairly dull lead in Blomkvist
is a major handicap and dialling down Lisbeth’s ferocity (if only
slightly) is a mistake. There’s one moment towards the end where she
asks Blomkvist’s permission to kill someone, and while it’s there to
show her bond with him (and her alienation from conventional morality),
having her ask anyone’s permission for anything strikes a bad note. And
this retread can’t afford any of those.
3 out
of 5
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Australian release: 12th January,
2011
Official
Site: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Cast: Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara, Christopher Plummer, Stellan Skarsgård, Robin Wright, Steven Berkoff
Director: David Fincher
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