Verschwörung

A dull, nicely shot action thriller, if you love the Books (millenium trilogy) dont watch IT. Watch it on a Sunday's with a hangover and pizza.

While David Lagercrantz did a decent job of preserving the "Milennium feel" in the book, this movie totally lost that. Only the first Swedish movie managed to give the feel that nothing important was left out from the book, here intentionally most of the book was left out to give room for car chases and fights. The result is a banal action movie where all persons are two-dimensional.

As a girl, Lisbeth escaped from her psychotic Russian mob father leaving behind her sister Camilla. In the present, Lisbeth Salander (Claire Foy) is an avenging angel for abused women. She is hired by Frans Balder (Stephen Merchant) who is desperate to retrieve his computer program from the American NSA which is capable of controlling the world's nukes. NSA agent Ed Needham (LaKeith Stanfield) tracks the theft to Stockholm but thugs had already attacked Lisbeth and stolen the program from her. Her only clue is a security pic of a man with a spider tattoo. She recruits Mikael Blomkvist (Sverrir Gudnason)'s help who hasn't seen her for three years. The spider's web leads back to Lisbeth's father and her sister Camilla Salander (Sylvia Hoeks).

It's the second movie in the American version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo franchise. The story is new from a different novelist. Everybody is new. Lisbeth is new. Mikael is new. The director is new. That's all the more reason why the central relationship between Lisbeth and Mikael needs to be re-established much earlier. They aren't actually in the same room until over an hour into the movie. There is also a change in Lisbeth's crusade where she is normally a vigilante figure for female victims. In this one, she turns into James Bond with global nuclear war as her crusade. There's the NSA and the Russians. It's a Bond movie. It's not the same as the original. The story is not that confusing but it can be more focused. I like the concept of Camilla but like Mikael, she needs to get into the movie sooner. As for Claire Foy playing Lisbeth, she is fine but needs a bit more darkness and her sexuality. It's really like a Bond movie where darkness and sexuality exist but The Dragon Tattoo franchise is supposed to take it to a grimmer level.

Boy, a lot of people disliked this movie. It suffers from the strength of its predecessors. It also suffers from too much for one film. We don't get enough psychological foundation, for one thing The bad guys have way too much power and this thing they can launch is pretty hard to swallow. Imagine that she and her sister have the future of the world in their hands. Thirdly, it is based on a book, written after the original series (an average book but entertaining). the problem is it ignores major plot elements. I doubt we'll see any more of these films.

The original book trilogy (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest) were written by Stieg Larsson. There were movie versions of each released in 2009 starring Noomi Rapace. In 2010 there was the Millennium TV mini-series, which was a compilation of the three Swedish films with extended scenes/more stuff added back in. The three movies were re-released on DVD with the extra stuff added back in and these became the 'Extended Versions' of the films. In 2011 came the US remake of the first film. Since then, another author (David Lagercrantz) started writing a new series of books continuing the story on from the third book (as the original author, Stieg Larsson, had passed away). This new movie starring Claire Foy is the first film adaptation of the new series of books. The only 'remake' so far has been the 2011 version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Sadly, not enough people were first introduced to the character of Lisbeth Salander through Noomi Rapace's unparalleled performance, setting the standard by which all other portrayals should be compared. She did all the hard work/heavy lifting, bringing this character to life onscreen for the first time. Quite unfairly, she never scored an Oscar nomination (which I think she *should* have), nor did these original films receive all the praise that the US remake got. Whether it was the fact that the original film trilogy had subtitles, which people simply couldn't be bothered reading, I don't know, but it's a shame that the big flashy US remake got all the glory the original films/actress to play Salander should have. Those who told fans of the original Swedish films to 'Give the US remake a chance!' and dismissed the recasting of the Lisbeth role now know what it feels like. All the people whose first introduction to the characters of Lisbeth, Mikael, etc was the Fincher version clearly couldn't take their own advice, as a large percentage of them seem to be damning this new film, despite the fact that at least it's based on a book that *hasn't* been filmed previously.

I've seen complaints about Claire Foy as Lisbeth not looking vastly different to how she normally looks, and this is a result of Fincher going overboard with Lisbeth's look in his version, where she was downright alienesque in appearance. No, it *isn't* normal for Lisbeth to walk around with panda eyes/bizarre make-up. If you watched the second film in the original trilogy, you'd see she reserved the theatrical makeup for special occasions. That's what we get here in the opening scene, with Foy's Lisbeth sporting a swath of white paint over her eyes as she helps out a wife with an abusive husband. And the mohawk only appears here and briefly towards the end of the film. Fincher decided to go all 'comic book' with Lisbeth's look and created a 'heightened/hyper-reality', whereas this film is a bit more 'restrained'. No elaborate fights on escalators this time. When Lisbeth fights a guy hand-to-hand here, it's in a small enclosed area, brutal (not flashy), and she doesn't magically win.

We're now seeing the reaction from those who dismissed the part Noomi Rapace played in making the character of Lisbeth Salander as widely recognised as she is (or who simply don't wish to accept that the role originated with her), because they fell in love with the remake version, when the shoe is on the other foot. The outcry over 'their' version of Lisbeth being replaced is no different to those who didn't wish to see Noomi replaced. Yet they're acting like the US version is the ONLY version. Sorry to break it to you...she's not. Claire Foy gives us a more 'grounded' performance as Lisbeth, as she conveys the character's weaknesses/vulnerabilities, making her feel like more of a 'real' character as opposed to the comic book-like US version. To those complaining about this film's 'action'...so what if there's action? It's not like the remake was devoid of elaborate action scenes. Plus, here she uses her brains for getting out of sticky situations more often than her fists.

Sverrir Gudnason might not be as recogniseable as Daniel Craig...but that actually works in his favour. Rather than watching a non-action version of James Bond onscreen, we're getting to see a Mikael as he comes across in the books. He's more or less just a regular guy, and I think the actor portrays him believably. We only get short scenes between him and Foy's Salander, but their 'relationship'/friendship feels like it's already established. The remake seemed to put them together in no time and I didn't feel that was 'earned' like in the original. Sylvia Hoeks does a lot with limited screentime also. We don't really meet her Camilla until late into the film (though we're introduced to the sisters as children at the beginning), but she plays the 'coldness' well, showing just hints of vulnerability.

I read the book this movie's based on/adapted from when it was first released and didn't think much of it. The author just wasn't able to capture what made the original three books (which I've read each of multiple times) so great. However, I decided to give the book another try in preparation for seeing this movie. Maybe it's that this movie's such a 'loose' interpretation of the book, with it being quite a bit different, but I found the film version much more interesting. The problem is some people who only know the US remake are ignorant of what came before. They think that version is the ONLY one that exists. This is no doubt what has contributed to the IMDB rating being so (quite unjustly) low. Claire Foy *is* the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo...whether you like it/wish to accept it or not. Hopefully we get to see more of her in the role. Until then, do yourself a favour and watch the original trilogy.