The idea of adapting a book into a [good] movie has never been an intriguing one for me, as I have been disappointed with many screen adaptations, with just a few exceptions. Stieg Larsson’s highly popular novel, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo—the first book in his Millenium trilogy—is destined for a big screen adaptation with the trilogy selling over 15 million copies worldwide. The setting of the stories in Sweden help pique my curiosity as I don’t get to read many books with that country as the principal setting. Stieg Larsson was a journalist and an activist for civil and woman rights, and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo touches the subjects of sexual abuse and sexual violence. And computer hacking.
Stieg Larsson’s style (WARNING: Long, winding sentence ahead) of clinical writing to “report” the events and progression of the story using real locations described vividly along with his exposition and description of Sweden current history in politics, social and economy gives the story the investigative journalism feel that works well with the result that at present some tourism companies offer tour to Larsson’s fans to trace the steps the characters in the story take in the story.
Now, the movie—a Swedish-German joint production tries to stay true to the story, yet, some changes are unavoidable, mayhap, to make the movie more simple (which makes me like reading better than watching movies). Some characters are missing, notably the lead character, Mikael Blomkvist’s daughter. In the book she gives her father an important cue that helps Mikael discover a very important piece of important.
Mikael Blomkvist has been commissioned to investigate a locked-room murder mystery, and this becomes the center of the movie’s story, whereas in the book, other reasons and motivations spur him to tackle the mystery. The book’s Mikael Blomkvist the stud is replaced by a much tender one that may help the viewers to focus on the main storyline: murder mystery, and not when is the next time (in what pages) he jumps into bed with one woman or another—just like … this guy I know.
And computer hacking.
The book delves quite deeply into the world of hacking in which Lisbeth Salander (the character the title of the book and of the movie refers to) is an expert. The movie shows us Lisbeth tinkering with a program, hacking into some computers or others, having her notebook broken, feeling annoyed because of that, and that’s about it. We don’t get to feel her mastery in hacking, in how she obtains (read: steals) data, and hurts her enemies with this skill. We only get to see glimpses of her doing some hacking, and may need to use our imagination as to what effect what she does would do to her, or Mikael’s, enemies (And they say watching TV/films dulls your brain.)
Yet, overall, the movie is quite interesting to watch. Those who have not read the book won’t feel robbed of some events appearing in the book. Those who have read the book can see the characters they have come to know on paper come to life on screen. The story progresses in an even pace, and the twists are there to keep us pretty much guessing all the way till near the end of the movie.Michael Nyqvist, the actor who plays Mikael Blomkvist does a decent job portraying Mikael as an all-round good guy, and Noomi Rapace’s playing Lisbeth manages to catch Salander’s antisocial attitudes and awkwardness around people (or, is that wooden acting? Oh, well, think positive, they say… And her dragon tattoo rrraaawks!)
The topic of sexual abuse (The Swedish title Män som hatar kvinnor translates as Men Who Hate Women.) is present in many parts, and this helps me appreciate the late Larsson’s struggle for equality rights during his lifetime.
Hollywood’s intention to remake the highly successful novel/film into their own movie (to be released in 2011) has somehow made me cringe fearing the worst, as even though David Fincher is directing it (and Daniel Craig plays Mikael Blomkvist, for that matter) the tweets I’ve been following about a month ago related to this movie are all about whether Rooney Mara (she is to play Lisbeth Salander) really has a nipple pierce for the role. Ouch! Computer Hacking Expertise: Keep your expectation very, very low.
