Director: Niels Arden Oplev
Starring: Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace & Sven-Bertil Taube
An engaging mystery thriller and adaptation of the popular Swedish novel which manages to grip with its central story and intriguing characters for most of it’s, perhaps too, long running time.
Currently riding high in the paperback charts, the Millennium series of novels by Swedish novelist Stieg Larsson (who unfortunately passed away in 2004) is finally seeing critical and commercial acclaim beyond the author’s native shores. With all three novels in the series having been adapted into feature films in Sweden with a possible Hollywood remake in the works, the first of the Swedish adaptations The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is seeing release and exposing audiences the series’ popular characters. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, on the back of much hype and acclaim, is certainly an excellent mystery thriller. While its running time is perhaps a little too long, the film is generally well paced and the mystery itself and the lead characters engaging enough that what few flaws are present don’t distract from what is otherwise an intelligent and well made film.
Mikael Blomkvist (Nyqvist), an investigative journalist who has just lost a libel case involving a business conglomerate that set him up and is now facing a prison sentence, is approached by another wealthy businessman Henrik Vanger (Taube) who wishes to hire Blomkvist to investigate the disappearance and suspected murder of Vanger’s niece Harriet 40 years earlier. With only 6 months until he has to serve his prison sentence and in need of funds, Blomkvist accepts the case which involves him delving into the sordid history of the large Vanger family. Blomkvist soon finds unexpected aid from a young computer hacker named Lisbeth Salander (Rapace), a girl with a long history of suffering abuse who had been hired to monitor Blomkvist during his libel case. Salander having chosen to continue monitoring Blomkvist’s actions finds herself able to uncover new evidence on the Vanger case and soon finds herself partnered with Blomkvist to continue the investigation.
A Swedish adaptation of a highly popular, and dense, novel, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is very faithful to the source material. The central mystery itself might not leave much surprise as to the identity of the story’s main villain but the depth of the investigation and of the secrets it uncovers amongst the Vanger family history is both gripping and disturbing and it is more the journey to the truth than the destination that engages throughout. The investigation is helped by how deep and well rounded the lead characters of Blomkvist and Salander, particularly Salander whose past is incredibly important to the later novels, are along with plenty of interesting procedural moments as the pair dig up, sift through and interpret the various scraps of new evidence that they find. The filmmaker’s commitment to presenting the story of the novel as completely as possible does mean the film clocks in at almost three hours in length, there are occasional moments where the pace slows a little too much (the two lead characters themselves do not actually meet for most of the first hour) and there is a brief, ten minute moment when the film swerves too close to Hollywood cliché when the villain is finally revealed involving capture, rescue, justice and the old cliché of the villain explaining it all but this is minor, only slightly disappointing, detour from what is otherwise an intelligent drama.
There are several fine performances in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo too. Michael Nyqvist is a satisfying leading man, his Blomkvist’s innocence in the face of his impending conviction never in doubt or nor his morality. While the character’s past is not delved into here, giving Nyqvist little to work with in terms of developing the character’s persona beyond him being a diligent and moral investigator, his performance is nevertheless engaging and does present Blomkvist as a man who has seen much believably. The stand out performance in the film is Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth Salander. The opposite of Nyqvist’s character, Rapace has a wealth of motive and emotional turmoil to work with in terms of performing the role of Salander and her performance believably, and impressively, portrays Salander as the tortured, tormented yet far from vulnerable individual as she is portrayed in the books, made more impressive by the actress’ slight physical frame (though she is of larger build than the novel describes Salander). The performance marks Rapace as an actress to watch and her performance do justice to the character who is the most popular protagonist in the Millennium series of novels. Amongst the solidly performed supporting roles, the one additional performance of note is Sven-Bertil Taube whose Henrik Vanger is warm and sympathetic and whose love for his niece is keenly felt in Taube’s performance.
Faithful almost to a fault, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, despite its extended running length and a brief detour into Hollywood style cliché, actually remains an incredibly gripping, well made and impressively performed mystery thriller which effectively illustrates why the novels of Larsson are so popular whilst doing them justice on screen. Impressive.
Rating: 4/5
