Starting from this week, I will review some front runners in Academy Awards this year. Starting from David Fincher's brooding The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, next up next week is The Artist.
The film kicks off with awesome opening credits, with thumping music from Trent Raznor and Atticus Ross. Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig), publisher of famous magazine Millennium, is in legal troubles due to his allegations about billionairem, influential industrialist Hans-Erik Wennerström. He loses the trail; and his credibility. We switch our focus to Henrik Vanger, CEO of Vanger Industries, living in an isolated island in northern Sweden. His niece, Harriet Vanger, is either missing or murdered, and he suspects a family member has done this. Impressed by 'detective-abilities' of Mikael, he offers him a job to investigate his family history and find the killer; in exchange with financial rewards and solid evidence against Wennerström, Harriet disappeared during a family meet-out in Summer, when due a road accident, the main road was blocked and the whole island was cut-off from the mainland. Mikael moves to island and begins his investigations.
In the meantime, Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara), an eccentric, smart and brilliant computer hacker, is labeled 'asocial' by the local government due to several violent assaults and drug abuses by her. Her guardian suffers from a stroke, and is replaced by lawyer Nils Bjurman, who sexually abuses her in exchange of money. Lisbeth takes her revenge, by shooting his rapist actions through a hidden camera, striking him down by a jolt of electric shock, tying him down with handcuffs, torturing him, and writing "I am a racist pig" with tattoo ink on his chest. Needing an assistant, Mikael's lawyers suggest Lisbeth for the task. Both Mikael and Lisbeth start investigating together, although keeping emotions apart, they develop a short sexual affair.
Through series of small evidences joined together, they both come to a conclusion that Martin Vanger, current CEO of Vanger Industries and brother of Harried Vanger, killed Harriet and was abusing her since childhood. As Martin dies in a car accident, they actually realize that Harriet was not killed, but she ran off to Australia to flee from her abusive family. She returns to Sweden and happily becomes the new leader of Vanger industries, while Lisbeth helps Mikael to find trustful evidences against Wennerstrom, as Henrik back offs from his promises. Mikael again writes an explosive article against Wennerstrom with strong evidences; Wennerstrom is destroyed and "I love you and I love you don't" sort of relations develop between Mikael and Lisbeth.
This film belongs to Rooney Mara - her Swedish accent and her body language is impeccable. She brings the character of Lisbeth Salander alive - even after the film ends, you are left with her. Her voice resounds in your head. She is one of the most deserving nominees for Best Actress Oscar this year. Daniel Craig is fine, completely over-shadowed by Mara. Chistropher Plummer makes some impact in early scenes, while the rest of the cast is pretty well.
The film is smartly directed by David Fincher.and brilliantly edited. However, the script does have some problems - a few things could have been turned much more simpler, specially the investigating process. Further, the huge family tree of Vangers could have been turned a lot shorter. The film also inherited a generic flaw from the book, and the flaw is over-exaggerated character of Lisbeth, but we can ignore it.
One of the high point in technical section is cold hued cinematography by Jeff Cronenweth and highly atmospherical music and yet highly affecting music by Raznor-Ross duo. This is perhaps the first time I liked their music.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo isn't flawless, the sense of urgency and the 'mystery' is somewhat lost in highly complex and bloated investigations. Certainly thousand times better than Zodiac, but nowhere near Se7en, the film is still an involving thriller. Watch it for 'the girl with the dragon tattoo' herself.
While the film isn't perfect, but Rooney Mara is.
David Fincher is well known for his mindblowing thrillers - Se7en, The Game and Zodiac, ofcourse the latter doesn't fits into the 'mindblowing' category, as such. Zodiac was a disappointing affair, mainly due to script problems and documentary-like narrative structure. But Mr. Fincher is back again with a bang, this time, with English remake (or you can say adaptation of the novel) of Swedish Film, Män som hatar kvinnor. Having not seen the Swedish version, I will certainly not compare the both films. Since the film is tricky and complex, I will write a summary here, spoilers :
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| Well, the tattoo isn't visible here. |
The film kicks off with awesome opening credits, with thumping music from Trent Raznor and Atticus Ross. Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig), publisher of famous magazine Millennium, is in legal troubles due to his allegations about billionairem, influential industrialist Hans-Erik Wennerström. He loses the trail; and his credibility. We switch our focus to Henrik Vanger, CEO of Vanger Industries, living in an isolated island in northern Sweden. His niece, Harriet Vanger, is either missing or murdered, and he suspects a family member has done this. Impressed by 'detective-abilities' of Mikael, he offers him a job to investigate his family history and find the killer; in exchange with financial rewards and solid evidence against Wennerström, Harriet disappeared during a family meet-out in Summer, when due a road accident, the main road was blocked and the whole island was cut-off from the mainland. Mikael moves to island and begins his investigations.
In the meantime, Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara), an eccentric, smart and brilliant computer hacker, is labeled 'asocial' by the local government due to several violent assaults and drug abuses by her. Her guardian suffers from a stroke, and is replaced by lawyer Nils Bjurman, who sexually abuses her in exchange of money. Lisbeth takes her revenge, by shooting his rapist actions through a hidden camera, striking him down by a jolt of electric shock, tying him down with handcuffs, torturing him, and writing "I am a racist pig" with tattoo ink on his chest. Needing an assistant, Mikael's lawyers suggest Lisbeth for the task. Both Mikael and Lisbeth start investigating together, although keeping emotions apart, they develop a short sexual affair.
Through series of small evidences joined together, they both come to a conclusion that Martin Vanger, current CEO of Vanger Industries and brother of Harried Vanger, killed Harriet and was abusing her since childhood. As Martin dies in a car accident, they actually realize that Harriet was not killed, but she ran off to Australia to flee from her abusive family. She returns to Sweden and happily becomes the new leader of Vanger industries, while Lisbeth helps Mikael to find trustful evidences against Wennerstrom, as Henrik back offs from his promises. Mikael again writes an explosive article against Wennerstrom with strong evidences; Wennerstrom is destroyed and "I love you and I love you don't" sort of relations develop between Mikael and Lisbeth.
This film belongs to Rooney Mara - her Swedish accent and her body language is impeccable. She brings the character of Lisbeth Salander alive - even after the film ends, you are left with her. Her voice resounds in your head. She is one of the most deserving nominees for Best Actress Oscar this year. Daniel Craig is fine, completely over-shadowed by Mara. Chistropher Plummer makes some impact in early scenes, while the rest of the cast is pretty well.
The film is smartly directed by David Fincher.and brilliantly edited. However, the script does have some problems - a few things could have been turned much more simpler, specially the investigating process. Further, the huge family tree of Vangers could have been turned a lot shorter. The film also inherited a generic flaw from the book, and the flaw is over-exaggerated character of Lisbeth, but we can ignore it.
One of the high point in technical section is cold hued cinematography by Jeff Cronenweth and highly atmospherical music and yet highly affecting music by Raznor-Ross duo. This is perhaps the first time I liked their music.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo isn't flawless, the sense of urgency and the 'mystery' is somewhat lost in highly complex and bloated investigations. Certainly thousand times better than Zodiac, but nowhere near Se7en, the film is still an involving thriller. Watch it for 'the girl with the dragon tattoo' herself.
