The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo: Film And Score Review

By: Arlene R. Weiss

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Poster

Sadly, Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson passed away in 2004 at only fifty years old, before he could witness the publication, acclaim, and monumental success of his Millennium thriller-novel trilogy and its subsequent transformation into the universally, critically and commercially acclaimed 2009 Swedish film adaptations that caused a worldwide sensation. So much so, that now, the greatly anticipated 2011 English language adaptation of the first motion picture in the Millennium film series,The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, directed by David Fincher, has just been released to much fanfare.

Fincher’s modus operandi of cinema verite is his ability to play psychological sleuth and devil’s advocate, delving into the deepest conundrums of the mind, as he has done so well before in Zodiac, Se7en, last year’s The Social Network, and in the iconic cult classic, Fight Club. Moreover, nothing is off limits to Fincher in the realm of the twisted synapses to which he is willing to subject his audience to, to finally reach and thus reveal the pathology of his quarry.

The painful, very ugly, tortured, disturbing inner sanctums Fincher often approaches are all hung out to dry, all conventions shattered beyond repair, and never more so than in this hypnotically mesmerizing reinterpretation and remake of 2009’s Swedish film version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

Larsson’s original title, Man Som Hatar Kvinnor, or Men Who Hate Women, is the key component to what is a sordid and horrifyingly unnerving mystery whodunit involving the investigation of a serial killer’s decades long murder spree, and the potential homicide of missing sixteen year old Harriet Vanger some forty years ago. Are these crimes related somehow?

Remember that tag line, “Men Who Hate Women”, because that misogyny and recurrent theme of violence against women is the pile driving, relentless psychological and emotional motivation for the film’s anti-heroine Lisbeth Salander who must face off with the serial killer of women.

The film is also a study of irony in that people are not always what they appear to be, especially in our society’s all too black and white views of good and evil, societal acceptance, role models, social class system and social outcasts.

A stalwart Daniel Craig, portraying discredited and disgraced investigative Millennium Magazine journalist Mikael Blomkvist travels to a secluded island owned and maintained in residence by aging aristocrat Henrik Vanger (the always wonderful Christopher Plummer who conducts Henrik with canny aplomb), where he is hired to solve the murder of Henrik’s great niece Harriet, and in the process stumbles onto a series of serial killings of local women throughout the years.

Newcomer Rooney Mara is a marvel, inhabiting the title character, that of computer hacker, researcher, and goth punk Lisbeth Salander, with a remarkable vitality, intelligence, visceral ferocity, and unbreakable, spirited will, an almost invincible fortress of courage, like the dragon painted on her so defiantly.

For all of its bravado as a murder mystery thriller, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is in essence, a beautifully framed character study etched in delicate tendrils of balance and emotion. Both Mikael and Lisbeth have been betrayed and brutalized by trusted authority figures, “role model” pillars of society, and people in power. Both are ostracized in some form or another by society. Mikael for his alleged libel against businessman Hans-Erik Wennerstrom.  Lisbeth for her inability to fit in based on her anti-social outward appearance, behavior, and demeanor. Yet, they’re the only characters in the storyline who are imbued with selflessness and virtue, who seek justice for the innocent who have suffered harm, even at great cost to themselves.

These two wounded warriors set off sparks and a knowing, amiable chemistry as they each tentatively and warily learn to reach out to one another, initially as peers going outside of themselves to help others and then later to help one another. In doing so, they find themselves and become all the better for it, rising to the occasion and forming a bond, a connection of tenderness and compassion that Salander is new to experience and is particularly moved by.

Lisbeth gains self-esteem and confidence through Mikael’s regard and respect for her investigative skills, and for her as an equal, as a woman, and as a person. By Mikael innately just seeing and valuing Lisbeth as so much more than the tattooed, multiple pierced punk, social misfit that she brandishes as a shock value, defense mechanism, Mikael gently pulls the best part of Lisbeth out to her fore.

Daniel Craig gives a bravura and glowing performance as the underpinning to the film. It’s no easy task playing the steadfast foundation to the charismatic heroine. His understated emotion, fraught with moments of just being tender, gentle, compassionate, and kind, evokes an endearing, sweet quality that cuts through Lisbeth’s icy veneer of understandable, self-protecting emotional armor. Likewise, Mara is just luminous, responding to Craig with a radiant poignancy, warmth and vulnerability that is a compliment to her heroic strength, intelligence, and resilience.

I must say that Fincher could well learn the art of understatement, from Craig and Mara. While Fincher deftly pulls amazing performances from his cast, the film’s narrative would fare better from not being weighed down by Fincher’s heavy handed, distracting reliance on fast pace editing and timing. Too often when the characters have a deep, tender, or powerful moment or dialogue, Fincher jumps too hastily to a new frame or scene without allowing the emotion to resonate or distill fully. (Something which Swedish Director Niels Arden Oplev handled with skilled grace in the 2009 version.)

Even the telling opening credits with Yeah Yeah Yeah’s, Karen O’s ballistic, wailing cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” set to high gloss computer generated effects, projects and sets up a polished, jacked up feel and pace that dilutes the well-drawn, thought out script, dialogue, and narrative.

Fincher also has a nasty habit of injecting too many unnecessary slick action sequences, rather than providing further insight into the very complex heart and mind of Lisbeth. Significantly and moreover, when Lisbeth is questioned by Mikael about her troubled past, Fincher makes what should be Lisbeth’s most provocative and revelatory line of dialogue, more comically flip than insightful. Comparatively, the 2009 film version intently pondered detailed, quiet, somber moments depicting Lisbeth’s serious thoughts, reflections, or memories of inner emotional turmoil, revelations, and complexities and in doing so, it shed great illumination and understanding into her character.

Fincher, however, acquits himself superbly and far more astutely than Director Oplev personified in the 2009 version, via Fincher’s and screenplay writer Steven Zaillian’s wonderfully written, multi-textured character portrait of Blomkvist. With Mikael, Fincher takes us on an intimate journey within the journalist’s deepest emotional cornerstones.

Fincher is astonishingly adept at crafting his male leads’ personas as exhibited here and in his previous film forays. However, this is an intelligent, analytical mystery whose title character is an empowered woman who has been abused by men, on the trail of a sociopath who loathes and kills women. The central character’s emotional and psychological complexities drive the narrative and are the key to solving the crime. Sensitivity to the source material and due care and subtlety are essential to the storyline.

Trent Reznor’s and Atticus Ross’s provocative score speaks in subtly hushed shades and tones, compellingly voicing and serving the essence of the film. The composing team have crafted darkly vibrant themes, cues, and motifs richly hued with sparse, stripped down, intricate yet ornate instrumentation, almost semi-acoustic in nature though created in an electronic environment.

Understated, delicate piano and percussion, along with lyrical xylophone and gamelan like, bell-toned textures within synthesized programmed arrangements, realize an atmospheric aura of haunting isolation and darkness, a mosaic of dread.

Melodic context is withdrawn in favor of more distinctive abstract rhythms and multi-layered sonic colors that paint dynamic, multi-dimensional soundscapes, conjuring the deepest emotional conduit and uttering a musical vocabulary that beckons the farthest and most tormented reaches of the soul.

Each note, each accent is assured, premeditated, and resonates within the consciousness, an enigma to evoke the prism of complexities within Lisbeth and the film’s serial killer, as powerful as the never ending snow that keeps falling and the frozen, desolate winter that envelops the characters throughout The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Its sonic nuance, like the snow blanketing the countryside, reverberates everywhere, sprinkling a chill of foreboding, suspense, treachery, and deceit…yet perhaps also a cleansing purity, a stark pale truth to be revealed that is just on the horizon.

I could have done, however, without the Nine Inch Nails, “NIN” self-ingratiating promotional grandstanding emblazoned on the T-shirt of one of Lisbeth’s computer hacker friends. We get it Trent, we know about your band and would appreciate the same cerebral subtly as your score.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a dazzling film, supremely elevated by the enigmatic, charismatic performances of the incandescent Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig who both are a breathtaking triumph in this motion picture, beautifully photographed on location among some of Sweden’s most striking vistas.

Word is that David Fincher may be tapped to direct the two motion picture sequels to Larsson’s thriller novel trilogy. A much more emotionally satisfying portrait would be best served and achieved by Fincher’s emphasis on a more thoughtful script and narrative that just as Lisbeth and Mikael extend to one another, takes its time in regarding and drawing out not only the best and brightest of Lisbeth but also the innermost complexities and resolve of her emotional core and immense character.

© Copyright December 26, 2011 By Arlene R. Weiss-All Rights Reserved