The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Is it overrated?

[mooshie78]

I agree - I thought it was very well done, and while a bit different from the Swedish version (the American version felt darker, starker, more "bleak"), I thought it and the performances were just as good as the Swedish version. 

Which isn't to say DYB's opinion is wrong - just different.  Movies are such subjective things - if you're interested, go see it for yourself. 

Oh absolutely, films, books, etc. are 100% subjective.  I didn't mean in anyway to knock DYB's opinion.

But just to say that Tony shouldn't be put off of seeing if because of one person's opinion.  Not everyone is going to like every film.  If you're interested in a film, go see it and form your own opinion.  Especially if it's something that's getting mostly positive reviews, and this is at 86% fresh on RottenTomatoes.

Aggregate review sites like that are about all I go by when on the fence.  Any review or forum post is just one persons opinion, which may or may not match mine.  But my tastes lean fairly mainstream, so I usually like most movies that are 80% or better and in a genre I like.  But if it's something I'm really interested in I'll go see it (or at least rent it from Netflix) regardless of review averages.  So I really only check for movies I don't know much about.

[DYB]

There are many reasons I was so disappointed by the US version.  Here are some thoughts, in no particular order.  Rooney Mara is good.  Noomi Rapace was spectacular.  (I was surprised by how much I liked Daniel Craig, who I thought completely wrong for the part.  He played Blomkvist very bookish and not Bond-ish at all, which was absolutely right.  Craig was the one pleasant surprise.)  More generally, the US film - while still filmed and taking place in Sweden (with actors from various countries speaking English with a variety of accents*) - might as well have been set and filmed in Maine.  Anywhere there's snow, really.  For Larsson the Swedish setting was very important.  The history of Sweden and its Nazi associations was vital to the narrative.  And it is almost entirely lost in the US version; that sense of history of the country, its place in Europe.  The fact that the prostitutes are "imported" from the former Soviet republics, it's all lost in the US version.  I suppose because American audiences in general don't care about the world outside of its own borders, and Fincher and his screenwriter simplified the story to be more "universal."  But by making it more universal and by making Sweden much more of an "every country" they have actually, I felt, diluted the impact.

Lisbeth's attachment to Blomkvist makes little sense in the US version.  Blomkvist certainly does not in any way encourage her "affections."  And because of the changes to the narrative they don't spend a lot of time together in the first place.  (In the original version they discover a lot of the old murders by traveling together and, dare I say, "bonding."  By separating them in their investigations the US version minimizes the time they actually spend together and the horrors they witness.)  Lisbeth's emotional attachment to Blomkvist did not at all feel earned; her jealousy in the end was kind of absurd.

I did not at all understand why Bjurman was turned into a somewhat sympathetic figure in the US version.  He shows guilt and concern for Lisbeth after savagely raping her.  (As he writes the check he looks with concern at her, then kindly offers to give her a ride home).  And then even begins an apology when she returns to exact her revenge.  I don't think they made Bjurman more complex, if that was their intent.  They just seem to have chickened out.  Speaking of chickening out, I remember when I saw the Swedish version with a friend - after Lisbeth exacts her revenge on Bjurman - my friend remarked that the scene would never play this way in an American film.  It would make the men too uncomfortable.  He was right.  The US version of Lisbeth's revenge is less graphic.  In the Swedish version Lisbeth takes out a sex toy - a dildo.  The item Lisbeth takes out in the US version does not look like your common sex toy; it's a metal contraption that is clearly meant to be seen as a device of torture.  At the same time, even as Fincher tries to make the men not feel too uncomfortable, the sexual assault on Lisbeth is just about as graphic in the US version as in the Swedish.  In fact, Rooney Mara shows us everything in the course of the film.  Daniel Craig, conversely, shows us nothing.  In a movie that is about the sexual exploitation of women it is interesting to see the director exploit his actress, but spare his male stars every embarrassment.

Then there was the dungeon scene in the end.  So completely unremarkable in the US version.  I really thought that's the moment Fincher would give us something to have bad dreams over.  But it comes and goes with very little impact.

Also, in the Swedish version Lisbeth watches a certain someone in a car for some time before the car bursts info flames.  She clearly has time to save him - and chooses not to.  In the US version she is not given the opportunity.  Another moment where they chickened out.

The actual change made to Harriet's whereabouts was an interesting solution; I actually rather liked it.  Not sure if it makes it more or less believable though.

*Everyone in this Sweden speaks English. But newspaper headlines are in Swedish.  Why?

Oh and just remembered the addition of Blomkvist's daughter who is finding God.  Huh?  I don't actually remember if he had any children in the book (if he did, the fact obviously didn't make much of an impression.)  I realize she recognized the Biblical references in Harriet's code, instead of Lisbeth.  But I'm not sure what that added to the narrative.  Every time she came on screen I thought to myself: "What?  I don't get it.  Why?  Is this a change for the sake of change?"

[Meemo]

There are many reasons I was so disappointed by the US version.  Here are some thoughts, in no particular order.  Rooney Mara is good.  Noomi Rapace was spectacular.  (I was surprised by how much I liked Daniel Craig, who I thought completely wrong for the part.  He played Blomkvist very bookish and not Bond-ish at all, which was absolutely right.  Craig was the one pleasant surprise.)  More generally, the US film - while still filmed and taking place in Sweden (with actors from various countries speaking English with a variety of accents*) - might as well have been set and filmed in Maine.  Anywhere there's snow, really.  For Larsson the Swedish setting was very important.  The history of Sweden and its Nazi associations was vital to the narrative.  And it is almost entirely lost in the US version; that sense of history of the country, its place in Europe.  The fact that the prostitutes are "imported" from the former Soviet republics, it's all lost in the US version.  I suppose because American audiences in general don't care about the world outside of its own borders, and Fincher and his screenwriter simplified the story to be more "universal."  But by making it more universal and by making Sweden much more of an "every country" they have actually, I felt, diluted the impact.

Lisbeth's attachment to Blomkvist makes little sense in the US version.  Blomkvist certainly does not in any way encourage her "affections."  And because of the changes to the narrative they don't spend a lot of time together in the first place.  (In the original version they discover a lot of the old murders by traveling together and, dare I say, "bonding."  By separating them in their investigations the US version minimizes the time they actually spend together and the horrors they witness.)  Lisbeth's emotional attachment to Blomkvist did not at all feel earned; her jealousy in the end was kind of absurd.

I did not at all understand why Bjurman was turned into a somewhat sympathetic figure in the US version.  He shows guilt and concern for Lisbeth after savagely raping her.  (As he writes the check he looks with concern at her, then kindly offers to give her a ride home).  And then even begins an apology when she returns to exact her revenge.  I don't think they made Bjurman more complex, if that was their intent.  They just seem to have chickened out.  Speaking of chickening out, I remember when I saw the Swedish version with a friend - after Lisbeth exacts her revenge on Bjurman - my friend remarked that the scene would never play this way in an American film.  It would make the men too uncomfortable.  He was right.  The US version of Lisbeth's revenge is less graphic.  In the Swedish version Lisbeth takes out a sex toy - a dildo.  The item Lisbeth takes out in the US version does not look like your common sex toy; it's a metal contraption that is clearly meant to be seen as a device of torture.  At the same time, even as Fincher tries to make the men not feel too uncomfortable, the sexual assault on Lisbeth is just about as graphic in the US version as in the Swedish.  In fact, Rooney Mara shows us everything in the course of the film.  Daniel Craig, conversely, shows us nothing.  In a movie that is about the sexual exploitation of women it is interesting to see the director exploit his actress, but spare his male stars every embarrassment.

Then there was the dungeon scene in the end.  So completely unremarkable in the US version.  I really thought that's the moment Fincher would give us something to have bad dreams over.  But it comes and goes with very little impact.

Also, in the Swedish version Lisbeth watches a certain someone in a car for some time before the car bursts info flames.  She clearly has time to save him - and chooses not to.  In the US version she is not given the opportunity.  Another moment where they chickened out.

The actual change made to Harriet's whereabouts was an interesting solution; I actually rather liked it.  Not sure if it makes it more or less believable though.

*Everyone in this Sweden speaks English. But newspaper headlines are in Swedish.  Why?

The prostitutes/human trafficking were actually in book/movie two. 

I was about to say so was the part about the man burning in the car, but then remembered there were actually two different instances of a man burning in a car, one in the first, one in the second - I don't remember much about the Swedish version of Dragon Tattoo, but if she stopped and looked in the Swedish movie, that was a change from the book (I just pulled the book up & looked).  The American movie is actually closer to the book in that matter, although neither showed the same type of "accident" as the book (it wasn't an accident in the book).  Interesting, I'd forgotten about that bit of a tie-in between the first book & second, men burning in cars....

As far as Bjurman went, I didn't see his actions afterwards so much as "guilt" as being oblivious to the nature of what he'd done.  (More like "Gee, you don't seem happy - what's the problem?  I mean, you're getting the money you came for...")  And believe me, that instrument of torture she used made DH feel plenty uncomfortable - he was literally squirming. 

Maybe the headlines are in Swedish to remind us they're in Sweden...since they're speaking English.  

Like I said - movie viewing is totally subjective.  

[bordercollielady]

The actual change made to Harriet's whereabouts was an interesting solution; I actually rather liked it.  Not sure if it makes it more or less believable though.

So interesting.. this is the one thing that bothered me.   I kept waiting for that to happen and it didn't.     So yes - movies - like books - are so subjective.   Did you even like the cinematography?   I thought that was wonderful.

[DYB]

The prostitutes/human trafficking were actually in book/movie two.  

It's bigger in movie 2, but it starts in part 1 - the prostitute we are told was in the cage, for example.  Plus, in the Swedish version when they show all those polaroids...harrowing.  In the US version the actions of the person in question are glazed over.  My background is from Russia/Europe and the European perspective on nationalism within Europe, the values, and the changes since the fall of communism are not easily understood or explained.  The issue of human trafficking, of women being brought from former Soviet block, is a pandemic.  And we get a first, frightening glimpse of it in part 1; it is then expanded in part 2.  The entire historical and cultural place of every European nation within Europe, and what that means for every country's past, present and future, is enormously complex.  These were among the issues Larsson was covering and the Swedish version got much more successfully.  The US version largely erased it, which, in my opinion, makes the story so small.

[DYB]

So interesting.. this is the one thing that bothered me.   I kept waiting for that to happen and it didn't.     So yes - movies - like books - are so subjective.   Did you even like the cinematography?   I thought that was wonderful.

Yes, it was beautifully shot.  The cinematographer, Jeff Cronenweth, is one of the best in the business.  I suspect the movie's budget was several times higher than the entire Swedish miniseries.  Unfortunately I thought they didn't capture Sweden particularly well.  It was just some place, beautifully photographed.

The solution to the mystery was an interesting solution.  But like I said, I'm not sure if it makes it better or worse, more or less believable.  It's definitely different.

[mooshie78]

Certainly a fair take on the movie.  Best response I have is that stuff just didn't bother me at all.  I like the books/movies for the mystery plot and the Lisbeth and Mikael characters and wasn't that fixated on/interested in the setting and other stuff.  I liked this that this version honed in more on the "meat" of the story so to speak.

But I also liked the Swedish films as well, and plan on buying the extended mini-series version on Bluray when I find a good price on it. Always neat to have different adaptations of a book you love!

[DYB]

Certainly a fair take on the movie.  Best response I have is that stuff just didn't bother me at all.  I like the books/movies for the mystery plot and the Lisbeth and Mikael characters and wasn't that fixated on/interested in the setting and other stuff.  I liked this that this version honed in more on the "meat" of the story so to speak.

But I also liked the Swedish films as well, and plan on buying the extended mini-series version on Bluray when I find a good price on it. Always neat to have different adaptations of a book you love!

I bought the mini-series version when it came out.  Like with the extended "The Lord of the Rings" movies I found the extended "Millennium Trilogy" to move faster!

[Meemo]

It's bigger in movie 2, but it starts in part 1 - the prostitute we are told was in the cage, for example.  Plus, in the Swedish version when they show all those polaroids...harrowing.  In the US version the actions of the person in question are glazed over.  My background is from Russia/Europe and the European perspective on nationalism within Europe, the values, and the changes since the fall of communism are not easily understood or explained. 

Which may be why they didn't bring it up much in this 2.5-hr movie - hopefully they'll make the next book into a movie and they can get into it more with that one - but as you said, all the European perspective and nuances are going to be difficult to explain to an American audience in a two hour movie. 

I suppose one example is that because there were probably 2 years between when I read the first book and the second, I didn't even make the connection between the mentions of human trafficking in the first book and the overarching nature of it in the second. 

[CoraBuhlert]

I did not at all understand why Bjurman was turned into a somewhat sympathetic figure in the US version.  He shows guilt and concern for Lisbeth after savagely raping her.  (As he writes the check he looks with concern at her, then kindly offers to give her a ride home).  And then even begins an apology when she returns to exact her revenge.  I don't think they made Bjurman more complex, if that was their intent.  They just seem to have chickened out.  Speaking of chickening out, I remember when I saw the Swedish version with a friend - after Lisbeth exacts her revenge on Bjurman - my friend remarked that the scene would never play this way in an American film.  It would make the men too uncomfortable.  He was right.  The US version of Lisbeth's revenge is less graphic.  In the Swedish version Lisbeth takes out a sex toy - a dildo.  The item Lisbeth takes out in the US version does not look like your common sex toy; it's a metal contraption that is clearly meant to be seen as a device of torture.  At the same time, even as Fincher tries to make the men not feel too uncomfortable, the sexual assault on Lisbeth is just about as graphic in the US version as in the Swedish.  In fact, Rooney Mara shows us everything in the course of the film.  Daniel Craig, conversely, shows us nothing.  In a movie that is about the sexual exploitation of women it is interesting to see the director exploit his actress, but spare his male stars every embarrassment.

They made Bjurman somewhat sympathetic in the US version? Ugh, I'm just getting a little sick here. A few days ago, I saw some clips from the US adaption and thought, "Bjurman doesn't look nearly sleazy enough."

Oh and just remembered the addition of Blomkvist's daughter who is finding God.  Huh?  I don't actually remember if he had any children in the book (if he did, the fact obviously didn't make much of an impression.)  I realize she recognized the Biblical references in Harriet's code, instead of Lisbeth.  But I'm not sure what that added to the narrative.  Every time she came on screen I thought to myself: "What?  I don't get it.  Why?  Is this a change for the sake of change?"

I don't remember whether Blomkvist had children in the books either. He most certainly didn't have any in the Swedish film adaptions.

[Mike McIntyre]

Depends on who's rating it...

The New York Times called it "half-formed and weak."

And also "boring and incomprehensible."

Did they underrate it?

[Tony Richards]

Oh absolutely, films, books, etc. are 100% subjective.  I didn't mean in anyway to knock DYB's opinion.

But just to say that Tony shouldn't be put off of seeing if because of one person's opinion.  Not everyone is going to like every film.  If you're interested in a film, go see it and form your own opinion.  

Oh look, don't get me wrong. I'm certainly going to see the movie, whatever other people's opinion of it. Even rotten reviews in newspapers don't put me off -- I prefer to make my own mind up.

As for the book, there's a lot wrong with it, for sure. But books we like are like people we like ... we know what their weaknesses are, but love them for their overriding strengths. And the good aspects of TGwtDT far outweigh its bad points.

[Nickmiles74]

Yes!

[tinytoy]

I had a lot of trouble distinguishing among all the different characters in police department, security business, magazine company, detectives, lawywers, and gansters, etc.  There were too many of them and the names were too similar.  That drove me nuts.

I am starting to have the same problem now, a little more than 1/2 way through book 2. I keep reminding myself that I made it through (and loved) A Game of Thrones / A Song of Ice and Fire series so I should be able to handle this.  hehe.  Maybe I need a cast of characters chart. 

[tinytoy]

Blomkvist's daughter visits him in Hedestad in the first book.  Her time is brief but I do recall something she says igniting something in Blomkvist's mind re the link between the bible and Harriet's numbers.

I don't think the daughter was mentioned at all as part of the back story in the beginning of the book and just surprisingly shows up to pay him a visit, but I might be wrong.  The back story portion is somewhat of a blur to me.

[mooshie78]

Blomkvist's daughter visits him in Hedestad in the first book.  Her time is brief but I do recall something she says igniting something in Blomkvist's mind re the link between the bible and Harriet's numbers.

I don't think the daughter was mentioned at all as part of the back story in the beginning of the book and just surprisingly shows up to pay him a visit, but I might be wrong.  The back story portion is somewhat of a blur to me.

Been a while since I read it myself, but I think you're right on that.

[Andrew McCoy]

The daughter who visits Blomkvist stays with his ex-wife. She's on her way to a bible camp when she stops off in Hedestad. She solves the mysterious numbers by asking him what he is doing with Bible references.

***

To answer the main question of the thread. Yes, all three books are overrated. The reasons they are overrated has to do with politics rather than with literature (they are not even remotely related to literature except in the feverish imaginations of the political far left to which Larsson belonged), and also with the timing of the launch of Larsson's trilogy in English coinciding with the arrival of the Kindle.

All three are seriously bad books, and the translator and editors are not solely to blame. Larsson simply wasn't a good writer. His Swedish editor characterised his style as "efficient" -- when your own editor can find nothing more flattering to say about your style than a compliment a council personnel officer might pay a street sweeper, it isn't much of a style!

However, inside each of those three turgid novels hides a good if much slenderer thriller absolutely screaming to get out. And for letting them be obscured behind the digressions and shopping lists, the editors are definitely responsible. Their problem was that, by the time an editor who wasn't under the spell of the handsome Larsson got his hands on the book, Larsson was dead. The convention is that an editor doesn't make substantial changes without the consent of the author. If the author is dead, the owner of the copyright is normally asked for consent. With Gabrielsson, Larsson's common-law wife, an articulate and telegenic fanatic, on the warpath, claiming to be the sole moral authority on Larsson's work, no editor dared make any changes.

***


There are readers of Larsson's Millennium Trilogy who absolutely, definitely, vocally love the shopping lists. One reader took the shopping list of Salander furnishing her apartment, priced everything at Ikea, and concluded that it was proof that Salander was a real hacker, because she spent only a little on cheap furniture for the rest of her apartment but for her computer -- the best Mac, of course -- she bought the best furniture.

***

The three Swedish movies (I haven't seen the American remakes) demonstrate how much tighter the core story inside Larsson's three fat novel could be told. They waste no time on the digressions and irrelevant subplots.



sorry, no self promotion allowed outside the Book Bazaar

[mooshie78]

Other than the overlong beginning of the first book that had too much detail on the libel case and the Vanger family history, I liked all the extra detail and subplots of the books.

If it was just boiled down to the main thriller/mystery plot line, I'd have rather just seen the movie as I can consume the main plot much faster that way.

It's a big reason I don't like a lot of thrillers.  Everytime I read something like The Lincoln Lawyer and then see the movie, I end up wishing I'd just saved the time and watched the movie and thus consumed the same story more efficiently.

The one thing that sets books apart from movies is having more time and space to not just tell the main story, but also get in the characters' heads, spend more time outlining the setting and culture, getting to know the characters better through sub plots and details about them not related to the main plot etc.

If it's all just a straightforward, plot driven novel, then I'll just watch the movie if available and get the same story consumed much faster.

But that's just me, I'm a bigger movie buff than I am a book worm, and I'm not that obsessed with reading to admire the prose and all that.  I'm about stories first, and if I'm going to read a book that has a movie version, the book better do more than just tell the exact story the movie adaptation focused on.

[DYB]

Ahhhh, so anti-Nazism and anti-human trafficking is just the "feverish imagination of the far left?"  Who knew!  I very much doubt that the millions of people who have read and enjoyed the books all belong to the "far left."

[JEV]

It is very slow to start, but as far as being overrated, it's become such a phenomenon that is would have to be sheer perfection not to be in some sense overrated.  It is not sheer perfection.

[PAWilson]

I enjoyed the book. The pace was slow and there was a 'foreign' feeling to it - different pace, different clues - but I wanted to know more after book 1. I think that's what series are all about.

I found the book much easier to enjoy than the original movies.

[slandon36]

This book started very slowly to me.  It finally got better around 100 pages in.  The other two books in the series were much better.