Tuesday, December 27, 2011

The GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO

“The GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO” (Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara, Christopher Plummer & Stellam Skarsgard)

My background going into this movie was – I did not read the book, I did not see the Swedish version and, until I saw the trailer, I had no interest whatsoever in seeing this film. The trailer presented an interesting storyline and reputable actors Daniel Craig and Christopher Plummer.
This is not your conventional murder mystery – it gets a little hard-core – as well as being about a girl who disappeared 25 years earlier without a trace.
Craig plays Mikael Blomkvist, a political writer that gets in hot water with the publisher of the magazine he writes for when he accuses a high ranking Swedish official named Wennerstrom of embezzlement. Mikael is disgraced when he can’t prove his case in court.
Mikael’s boss/secret lover (Robin Wright) sends him to meet with an elderly man named Henrik Vanger (Plummer) to both get him out of the public’s eye and to give him something to keep his mind off his recent troubles. Instead Mikael finds himself ensnared in a hornet’s nest of characters with questionable morals, otheriwse known as Vanger’s closest relatives. Close, and yet distant, as Blomkvist is told which relatives are not speaking and which, and which ones are on speaking terms but only if they aren't on speaking terms with the other relatives – And they all live in mansions that Henrik can see from his front yard.
Martin Vanger (Stellan Skarsgard) is the only relative who seems willing to help Mikael with his investigation. Skarsgard is a very good actor – I couldn’t tell what his character was thinking as he constantly swirled his glass of wine and seemed amused as Mikael became acquainted with his unsavory relatives.
Henrik’s request is for Mikael to use his investigative skills as a writer to figure out what happened to his niece, Harriet, who disappeared 25 years ago.
Mikael enlists the help of the woman that hacked into his computer and helped to bring him down in the court case against Wennerstrom.
“Why do you want me?” the female hacker asks, thinking Blomkvist is seeking revenge. “I was impressed with how you broke into my computer,” Mikael responses, “Now I want you to do it to him.”
The hacker is the title character, Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara) an unusual looking character, even for a geek. The more we learn of Lisbeth, the more we see that it isn’t just her hair that is an unsightly mess. The early scenes involving Lisbeth also had me wondering about how well her character was thought out – She gets mugged in the subway but is able to run down and beat the living snot out of the young thug that steals her purse, yet when Randy Bachman, of Bachman-Turner Overweight, attempts to rape her, he gets the upper hand quite easily.
It took me a while to feel sorry for Lisbeth because she is forced to do disgusting things to garner money to live on from lawyer Bachman - but what does she do with the money? She spends $3,000 on a tattoo (And it's not even the dragon!)
The film wants you to read the book, obviously, as Lisbeth’s quirks just didn’t happen overnight – she is deathly afraid of men touching her; when Mikael barely brushes against her as he stands up from the computer screen they’re staring at, she jumps like a scared cat at the bark of a big dog. Then, unexpectedly, she removes her clothing and joins Mikael in bed as if they were long-time lovers.
So, yes, Lisbeth has issues. But she’s also as loyal as a puppy once she finds a human being worth worshipping. She simply tells Mikael, “I like working with you.” and it seems clear to everyone except Mikael that she means ‘I’m falling in love with you’.
Even though I was intrigues by the trailer, I still wasn’t sure if ‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’ was going to be something I’d enjoy – or one of those ‘art house’ films I deplore. It’s the former – it’s good because it isn’t conventional – it’s downright bizarre at times. I was so glad that there weren’t any elongated scenes of martial arts nonsense – in fact there weren’t any at all and that’s what I was warned the books were about; a martial arts expert who was also a computer genius and mentally unstable. Mentally unstable computer genius’s I can live with – Martial arts experts, I cannot.
I still have no desire to read the books, but I’m in for the next Americanized installment of the series when it comes out on celuloid...

No comments: