The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, the first volume in Steig Larsson’s immensely popular Millennium Trilogy, is essentially about Lisbeth Salander’s response to the perpetration of violence against women, including herself. It’s original Swedish title translates as “Men Who Hate Women,” euphemistically changed to what long-time Larsson companion Eva Gabrielsson calls a title which sounds like “a children’s book.” No such dumbing-down-danger presents itself here, as long as this American version of the film has David Fincher (The Social Network, Zodiac, Seven, Fight Club) at its helm.
In addition to having an extraordinary knack for crafting just the right mood and setting for pure evil, Fincher is also the master caster and can film an action scene that is on par with the best of them. Lisbeth’s stealing back her swiped purse on a subway escalator is purely stunning to watch. But in remaking the 2009 Swedish film, it is in his casting and what he gets out of his actors where he not only equals the original but surpasses it. Stellan Skarsgard and Daniel Craig make us easily forget their Swedish counterparts. Overall Rooney Marta’s (The Social Network) depiction of the complex character Lisbeth gives the film it’s profundity. Her ascension from near-catatonic street punk to abused genius, near-catatonic street punk to vengefully heroic, and less catatonic street punk is as believable as it is marvelous.
This in a film where the procedurals border on the clunky and played out and are a dour variation on the film’s strengths. What we have here seems like a less great or even very good plot than a remarkable character study in a year of outstanding ones (Young Adult, Take Shelter, Martha Marcy May Marlene). Lisbeth is one doozy. She can hack any computer and figure out any code better than anybody. Originally hired to do a background check on fallen journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig and Larsson surrogate) they come to work together halfway through the film in trying to solve a decades-old disappearance of the niece of financial magnate Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer, who’s having quite a year).
Required to relocate to a remote island to investigate, the Vanger clan turns out to be a dysfunctional extended family, some of whom live next to each other and don’t talk to one another. A couple of their ancestors were no less than Nazis and one still survives. It is not revealing anything to say that he is not the villain responsible for the disappearance. Even a novel whose worldwide sales last year topped every other book in the world as “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” did, is not that silly. And even if it didn’t keep the original Swedish title it is at least bound to spur discussion of sexual abuse and misogyny at a time when our society certainly needs it. That is after the initial discussion surrounding Rooney Mara dies down. Her performance very much deserves the Golden Globe nomination she received for Best Actress. And David Fincher continues to roll on as one of our very best modern day directors.
8 Vengeances (Out of 10)