Reviewed by Danny the Demented
Updated 3 January 2012
OK, maybe I am being a bit TOO harsh but I have my reasons (which I will get to in just a minute, keep your pants on guys, geez). Based on the international best selling crime-novel of the same name, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo tells the story of Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig or Mr. Bond, take your pick) and Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara, the girl in the opening scene of The Social Network), how the two damaged protagonists came together to solve the mystery of a missing girl named Harriet Vanger that has remained unsolved for almost 40 years. Without giving too much away, it's a story of murder, rape, money laundering , torture, Nazi (that’s right, Nazi), and a whole lot of eye cringing evil stuff.....by the by Marilyn Manson called, he wants his darkness back. Oh did I mention this movie is R-rated? So i guess........er......don’t bring a date because it'd be AWKWARD!!
But really in essence the movie is about damaged people finding redemption in both the mystery and each other. And in all fairness David Fincher (the master behind Se7en, Fight Club, Panic Room, Zodiac, and The Social Network) did an ok job with the screenplay written by Steven Zaillian (the pen behind Schindler's List and Gang's of New York). However the approach Fincher took is confusing and ultimately fatal for two key reasons: 1. Instead of the depressingly dark approach (or über dark for you nerds) I know he is capable of (See Se7en, still one of the most disturbing yet fascinating movie I have ever seen to date), he chose the semi dark/hip approach he used when he did The Social Network (for those of you who have been living under a rock, its about Facebook, now go shave and rejoin society already). The two films share such jaw-dropping similar pace and cinematographic style that I couldn’t shake the feeling Mark Zuckerberg was going to pop up any minute and shout " I KILLED HARRIET AND POSTED ON FACEBOOK, HIT LIKE!!" . Why not go with the Se7en route that worked so well for you and put you on the map, Fincher? 2. Yes I know this movie is based on a Swedish novel and yes the setting is in Sweden, but since you hired mostly American/English actors for this movie, why not just let them speak in English? Fincher did, of course, have everyone speak English. The puzzling thing was, even though every character spoke English, Fincher (or someone who worked on this movie) insisted all characters spoke with a SWEDISH ACCENT. WHY???? What's the point? To make the characters more authentic because it’s a Swedish story? But all they were doing was speaking English with an accent. WTF? Either speak in Swedish or don’t. English with a Swedish accent was simply ridiculous, it's almost as if no one spoke English as their mother tongue in Hedestad but because there's an American in town (there isn’t) , so they are forced to use English because this person (does not exist) doesn’t speak Swedish. It was so preposterous that I found it distracting enough to pull me away from the plot. An irreversible mistake.
Because it moved like The Social Network, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo didn’t have enough time to build up any emotion connection between Mikael Blomkvist, his lover (Robin Wright, or better known as Jenny. You know, RUN FORREST RUN!, that Jenny) the suffering granduncle (Christopher Plummer) or any of his family members. Even Lisbeth, the heroine, had a rich back story that was mentioned in both the book and the Swedish film but not the US one. All in all, this movie was disappointing and unsatisfying. The Swedish film adaptation (the first one) is the superior version, and Mr. Fincher, you have been bested. Let's see if he can salvage this mess with the second and the third movie of this franchise, but if he doesn’t change course, the ship is heading straight for the iceberg called FLOP. My name is Danny and I endorse this message.
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