Courtesy - The Sunday Leader By Kamal Kalidasa
It must suck to be David Fincher. At the rate the Academy keeps snubbing him, year after year, any director of his caliber would’ve given up a long time ago. This is, of course, not to say he is after Oscar-gratification, but after Fight Club, Se7en, Zodiac and the Social Network, none of which was good enough for the Academy, you’d think it was time the man got some real recognition. But apparently it’s not to be, and I’m not sure his latest work The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, as amazing as it was, will help his cause in any real way (it clearly didn't at the last Oscars; but I’m talking long-term).
Based on the blockbuster Swedish novel by Stieg Larsson and a remake of the original adaptation by director Niels Arden Oplev, Dragon Tattoo is a cyberpunk thriller that boldly explores themes of rape, misogyny, incest, Neo-Nazism and, to a lesser extent, ethical journalism, in a two-hour English-language Hollywood spectacle that, while engrossing, just falls short of the Swedish version, in terms of delivery and originality. Of course, there is only so much originality you can expect from a remake, but Fincher has failed to make this story his own – something he did to great success in the Social Network. And the occasional almost-shot-for-shot similarities don’t help.
Mild spoilers ahead…
The premise is simple yet intriguing. Investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) has just lost a libel case filed against him by crooked industrialist Hans-Erik Wennerström (Ulf Friberg). Having lost his credibility as a result, Mikael leaves Millennium, the news magazine he is co-editor of. Meanwhile, retired Swedish magnate Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer) has hired Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara), a tattooed, pierced, bisexual and social-outcast computer hacker and brilliant researcher to do a background check on Mikael who he hopes to hire for an investigation of his own. Vanger approaches the reluctant Mikael with a promise of supplying him with dirt on Wennerström, and eventually hires his services to find out what happened to his grandniece Harriet who disappeared 40 years ago. Vanger is convinced that a member of his Nazi-loving, sexually deviant family is responsible, and won’t rest until he’s unveiled the truth.