The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo [DVD] [2011]

A disgraced financial journalist, and a young antisocial computer hacker join forces to solve the 40 year old mystery of a teenage girl's disappearance. As they do so, they get drawn into serious crime and corruption, deadly family secrets, and a string of unsolved murders of young women spanning fifty years, which puts their own lives at unbelievable risk. Will they solve the mystery before they become history?

When I saw the original movie series about two years ago, I was awestruck by mostly the awesome acting of Noomi rapace, and the movie's visual style, and it's inherent raunchiness, which is more common in stylish European thrillers than slick Hollywood movies. When I heard there would be an English version, I thought this would be a hard act to follow, and without Noomi Rapace as the female lead would not be the same, because she was so much an integral element of the original movies success.

In the meantime I listened to the audiobook version featuring Simon Vance, which I also found quite enjoyable. He does all the voices including Lisbeth with a slight Swedish accent that veers toward cockney. The story is much more detailed with many elements glossed over or left out of the original movie.

So, when I heard it was about to be released, and saw the trailer, and understood the pedigree behind this movie with David Fincher directing, and Daniel Craig as Blomquist, I made a point of going to the evening show before its official opening today.

Inevitably, one cannot help but compare with the previous experience. Definitely, the fact that this is in English is the greatest justification for the remake, so for many people who are distracted by subtitles this will automatically be a better experience.

Steven Zaillian, the screenwriter, previously won an Oscar for writing Schindlers List. From a storytelling point of view, it stays close to the original story, with much more detail, in that respect exceeding the original. In other respects too it exceeds the original. I particularly liked for example the soundtrack with its darker gothic metal tones by Trent Reznor, and the opening sequence with somewhat James Bond style imagery although darker, and I loved the storytelling.

This movie completes the full arc of the story, whereas I felt unclear in the original about the full circle story against Wennerstrom. This movie introduces the cat, and Cecilia Vanger as a character. We get to meet some of the characters we don't meet in the original.

David Fincher goes to great lengths not to have it be a remake, having each scene be somewhat different, so in only one scene did I have slight deja vu, which I appreciated. This movie is also raunchier, you'll know what I mean when you see it and focuses more on the relationship between Blomquist and Salander. It also has occasional humor. The scene where Michael is hunted shocked me in my seat, and there are several shocking scenes in the movie, including the crime against Lisabeth by her guardian. This is a harrowing scene as is the basement scene, although I felt that particular one was more harrowing in the original. In another movie, Zodiac, Fincher delivers one of the most suspenseful basement scenes ever when an investigative journalist is in the house of the suspected Zodiac killer.

Perhaps the single best thing about this version is that it captures the intention of the original author. Apparently, when Stieg Larson was a teenager he witnessed a gang rape of a teenage girl, and did not intervene to stop it. He was always troubled by this, second guessing his behavior, and worked as an independent investigative journalist, and this was partly his motivation for writing the Millenium Trilogy series which has now reportedly sold over 60 million copies, and the great visual art of 4 movies.

In fact, he gave the character Lisbeth the same first name as the original victim, so when Blomquist proposes to Lisbeth that she help him find a killer of women, one senses that Larson would be very pleased about this.

I liked also seeing Robin Wright as Blomquists partner, and while I still give the original movie the cool points for style and the visuals, I think many people will without my preconceptions warm to Rooney Mara who does give a great performance, in her unique way as this antisocial yet extremely resourceful and intelligent computer hacker.

I recommend it whether or not you have seen the original series. I also recommend you do check out the original series. If they do complete the rest of the trilogy, there will be opportunities in those movies to vastly outshine the originals, certainly if they include more detail from the books as they do here.

I think you will love it, and I hope this review was helpful.

I'm not going to go into too much detail about the plot of the film here, as it's covered in several other reviews. What I will say is if you have this BluRay and are about to put it in your player, and if you haven't read the book....then stop. Books are generally so much better than any film adaptation, and this is no exception. Read it, because the film - by comparison - is much shallower.

That said, Fincher's adaptation is largely true to the book, and where some people are saying there's no atmosphere and it feels sterile, my take on it is that this is anything but. Fincher injects his unique and compelling style to proceedings, from the wonderful opening titles to when the end credits roll. This is largely achieved by both the bleak visuals and the score which sucks you in without you noticing it. It's an uneasy score, which serves the events on the wintry island well.

The movie itself is won by a wonderful performance by Rooney Mara, absolutely compelling as Lisbeth Salander and pretty much identical to how I originally pictured her when I read the novel. Daniel Craig's performance is utterly overshadowed by this fantastic character, yet ultimately this again is how the book reads. There are some differences from the book though, and I think the film suffers slightly for it - there's little mention of the mysterious woman at the window (if you've read the book you'll know what I mean), and the ending has a slightly different twist for reasons unknown to me.

From a BluRay perspective, prepare to be wowed by a soundtrack which shows fantastic dynamic range. Some of the voices are difficult to make out, so making sure all channels are calibrated properly is essential, otherwise you may be reaching for the volume control. It's a well-layered affair, subtle use of surrounds for the most part, with the electronic movie score pervading many scenes at just the right level. And when action punctuates proceedings, hold on to your chair, because the dynamic swing is immense (if you have a surround system your subwoofer will be tested.)

Video quality is close to reference: great black levels and low level detail, and a wonderful punch in the brighter scenes. It's nothing less than you'd expect from a Fincher movie...superb.

Although David Fincher's English-speaking remake is a superior film as cinema,the original made-for-TV Swedish film was rougher,more ragged,closer to the bone,the characters more threatened.The remake in Sweden stays true to the source,but has the jarring note of all the characters apart from Craig(Blomkvist) speaking with a Swedish accent. Rooney Mara captures a complexity of character-vulnerable,unhinged,sexy, detached,steely and feminine,losing the spikey brittleness and demonic energy of the original.This tale of rape-revenge as well as political thriller exposing Sweden's hidden history of fascism is superbly directed, smoothing out kinks and convolutions in the plot, streamlining the narrative,reducing psychology to data. When Salander, in a scene very late in the film, tells Blomkvist about her early life,it registers neither as a "revealing moment" nor as a glimpse into her "motivation," but as another datum.The opening credits a petrol-dripping kaleidoscope of bodies,flowers,keyboards,dragons to Led Zeppelin's `Immigrant Song', mimicing a James Bond opening,with Blomkvist played by the current Bond.But this new man is ultimately saved by Salander,who outclasses and dominates him.

At times the story seems on auto-pilot; the result is slick,funereally chilly:a movie about an investigativeprocess rather than a crime.In the Oplev version(2009),characters are uneasy,less confident, emotions are closer to the surface.Some heartfulness has been flushed out with the bathwater in Fincher's version despite Mara's fresh take on Salander.In Oplev's film we had the original(subtitled) Swedish and it captured the pulpy spirit of the bookbetter. In Fincher's film the cinematography and editing are excellent as are Trent Reznor's and Atticus Ros's score,a tissue of connective membrane for the dramatic information.We also get a superb cast of back-up actors: Plummer, Wright,Skarsgard,Berkoff,James and Richardson. In this film more than the original, the stories of Mikael and Lisbeth are kept separate for an extended period. We learn about the girl's state-appointed guardian (Yorick van Wageningen), who abused her, stole from her and terrorized her.Her attempts to avenge herself would make a movie of their own.When the two meet an hour in we are fully primed up as to their combined motivation,to identify the serial killer,as lovers.

Fincher and his team do a good job of setting out an intriguing story. Fincher has a distinct visual sensibility and a good sense of pacing, and the film derives much of its momentum from Mikael's sleuthing into the lives of the Vangers and Lisbeth's high-tech hacking, which passes the smell test more easily here than it did in Arden Oplev's version.We live vicariously through the two idealised central characters in a wish-fulfilment fantasy disguised as thriller.The irony is that of the two versions I prefer the awkward sincerity of the original.If you see subtitles, never ask for your money back!The original got there first.Here Mara is the elf at Christmas,Rapace the kabuki-demon.