Review: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
Only two years after the Swedish adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s international best-seller, David Fincher has brought his take on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo to the silver screen. With little-known Rooney Mara cast in the role that made Noomi Rapace a break-out sensation and Daniel Craig starring opposite, Fincher has a sizable task in tackling a story loved in both its written and prior celluloid form. While the film is, on a whole, more faithful to Larsson’s vision, it never reaches the point that truly justifies this too-soon remake.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo: experience the gift of anal rape 26 December in the UK
Craig is Mikael Blomkvist, the shamed journalist who hands over the reins of his Millennium magazine to his editor and lover Erika Berger (Robin Wright). In financial ruin, Blomkvist is hired by retired industrial magnate Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer, again excelling as a frail patriarch) to investigate the murder of his niece. Sequestered in a charmless cottage on the family’s island, 4 hours outside of Stockholm, Blomkvist studies the family members, the case files and eventually requires the expertise of computer hacker Lisbeth Salander (Mara), who had herself investigated Blomkvist for Vanger. Though The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’s main thrust is a classic whodunit, the character development of Salander is essential in not only establishing her moral code, but in setting up the other 2/3 of the Millennium trilogy. Fincher balances this well, though Dragon Tattoo newcomers may be somewhat baffled by references to her past which portray her in a less than favourable light. While the mystery is Blomkvist’s to solve, the film is Mara’s to steal and she does so with vigour and a contempt that bubbles beneath the surface throughout, rising fiercely at all the right times.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo starts off on the right foot with a monochromatic title sequence that references events and symbols from Salander’s world as Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s “Immigrant Song” with Karen O on vocals blares, setting the tone for grittier, hard as nails adaptation. Mara’s performance is spectacular as the seething Salander. The trio of rape scenes are well executed and the brutality is felt, in large part to Mara’s selling of Salander’s rage. Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo allows for the humanisation of Salander by including scenes with her ailing former guardian, which Mara takes full advantage of by introducing a vulnerability to the character without it contradicting her established hardened nature. Mara outclasses Craig in every scene they share and he contributes little to the role of Blomkvist beyond his occasional attempts at sounding less English. Save for a few great atmospheric shots, such as Blomkvist’s train journey to the island, the film struggles to utilise the Swedish environs that the original depicted so well. Though lengthy, Fincher’s vision makes better use of its runtime than the Swedish original and the promised altered ending underwhelms as it mostly serves to tighten up the pacing. However, the story’s postscript, while pivotal, is still clunky. The fact that Fincher rushes through it, in order to get to the final important plot point, puts it at odds with the rest of the film that precedes it.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and it will likely go over very well with subtitle-adverse Salander virgins. Mara’s jarring performance is a definite star-turn and is deserving of recognition, but there’s little else here that’s truly notable. It’s a shame that Fincher couldn’t simply skip right to remaking The Girl Who Played with Fire, as the Swedes dropped the ball on Salander’s development beyond the initial film and it deserves a better re-telling. With Dragon Tattoo water is being tread to varying degrees of success. Still, if The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo allows for Mara to reprise the role in two superior follow-ups, the existence of this remake will prove to be far more worthwhile than it currently is. 8/10
