Daniel Craig (Casino Royale) has the role film’s secondary hero, Mikael Blomkvist, a once respected journalist recently convicted of libeling a prominent Swedish businessman. I do understand the casting of Craig in this role. His name is well known around the world and he has the look fitting the character. He does not however, have the acting range necessary to portray Blomkvist, a character balancing pride, disgrace and uncertainty in his career.
Shortly after his libel conviction, Blomkvist is offered a job by Henrik Vanger (played by the legendary Christopher Plummer), the patriarch of one of Sweden’s most powerful families. On paper, Blomkvist’s job is to write Henrik’s memoir. In reality, and the entire family knows it, he is to investigate the alleged murder of Henrik’s niece, Harriet, nearly forty years ago. At first, it seems a dead end venture for Blomkvist until an casual comment from Blomkvist’s daughter opens the door to the horrible truth behind the Vanger family.
Rooney Mara (great granddaughter of Pittsburgh Steelers founder Art Rooney) is Lisbeth Salander, the heroine of the story and title character of Stieg Larsson’s trilogy. She is a computer hacker extraordinaire with a photographic memory who looks like something straight from a Jane’s Addiction concert. Her antisocial behavior has her labeled as incompetent by the Swedish government and she is a ward of the state with a court appointed guardian. Her kindly old guardian has a stroke and her new guardian, despite the presence of Nazis in the Vanger family, is the most detestable character in the movie.
Yorick van Wageningen is Nils Bjurman, a disgusting pig of a man who forces Lisbeth to perform sexual favors in exchange for money from her own bank account. This escalates into a very brutal rape and subsequent revenge from Lisbeth. The scene is one of the most graphic I have ever seen and is difficult to watch. But I must give credit to Mara and van Wageningen for shooting a scene so frightfully real. Anything less would have weakened the film. Mara was nominated for a Golden Globe and an Oscar for her role as Lisbeth and rightfully so. Casting her was a bold and risky choice but it was definitely the correct choice.
David Fincher’s direction of this film is very similar to that of his breakthrough film Se7en and surprisingly Aerosmith’s “Janie’s Got a Gun” video, which he also directed. Fincher didn’t rely on graphic violence in Se7en, just images of the aftermath. He uses the same technique in Dragon Tattoo. The dark feeling and the editing techniques of “Janie’s” are very noticeable with this film also.
Stellan Skarsgard (Thor) and Joely Richardson (Nip/Tuck) also appear in this film as Martin and Anita Vanger.
Fans of the book may be disappointed with how the film wraps up the mystery of the Vanger family and how Erika Berger (Blomkvist’s editor and part-time lover) and Dragan Armansky (played smoothly by Goran Visnjic of ER) are shoved into the category of third tier characters. Even with all its cuts and changes, the film still runs at two and a half hours. It’s a tight, edge-of-your-seat thriller but you will definitely want to rent a comedy to watch afterwards.
