The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

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zedz
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#201 Post by zedz » Mon Jan 30, 2012 7:43 pm

You can reverse engineer the psychology and character details all you want, but the sad fact is that what we see in the film is simply an adolescent boy's fantasy. The only consensual sexual activity we've seen involving her to this point is lesbian; the hero / author surrogate walks in on her with her girlfriend (a narrative set-up that's only been done in approximately 7 million porn films already); and then he's 'seduced' by her without having to lift a finger because she's evidently been so thoroughly overwhelmed by his seething virility. It's pure 13-year-old wet dream stuff, no matter how much Fincher or the actors scrabble to find fig leaves to cover that up.

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Tom Hagen
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#202 Post by Tom Hagen » Mon Jan 30, 2012 8:09 pm

Another small detail I had neglected: in her dossier on Blomkvist, Lisbeth mentions that she is not impressed with his sexual performance based on her observations of Blomkvist and his girlfriend.

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R0lf
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#203 Post by R0lf » Mon Jan 30, 2012 8:10 pm

The problem with the relationship in the new film vs the old film is that the character relationship isn't set up in the new film and there is no reason for them to sleep together asides from the fact Roony Mara and Daniel Craig are hot.

By the time they sleep together in the original film Lisbeth's interest has been established by her following and then contacting Mikael and risking exposure for her unethical investigation. Also they both travel the country together and uncover a murder mystery - together. In the new movie they have been in a room with each other a couple of times.

In the original I remember Lisbeth's girlfriend also being a live in. This and the character relationship built with Mikael doesn't make you question why she would eagerly want to have so much sex after being brutally raped.
Last edited by R0lf on Mon Jan 30, 2012 8:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Andre Jurieu
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#204 Post by Andre Jurieu » Mon Jan 30, 2012 8:50 pm

zedz wrote:... then he's 'seduced' by her without having to lift a finger because she's evidently been so thoroughly overwhelmed by his seething virility...
I think in any other case I would tend to agree with your comments, zedz, but the only wrench in this idea, in this case, is that Blomkvist is not exactly exuding virility in that particular scene. I would actually characterize him as being especially effete during that scene. In fact, Craig portrays Blomkvist as kind of meek and passive after his initial interaction with Lisbeth at her apartment. I think what makes the scene mildly interesting is that she seems to be responding to Blomkvist acting mildly helpless and effeminate.

The only problem for Fincher is in the casting of Craig, since he naturally exudes a Bond-like machismo with his on-screen persona simply due to his resume, as well as the casting of Rooney, since she's considerably more feminine than her Swedish counterpart.

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Mr Sausage
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#205 Post by Mr Sausage » Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:55 pm

What sexual scenarios aren't an adolescent boy's fantasy?

I thought Lisbeth's actions were typical of a victim of abuse. The indiscriminate sexuality, the blunt initiations of sexual acts, the emotional detachment--it all read very differently to me than it did to zedz.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#206 Post by Fiery Angel » Mon Jan 30, 2012 10:50 pm

Andre Jurieu wrote:The only problem for Fincher is in the casting of Craig, since he naturally exudes a Bond-like machismo with his on-screen persona simply due to his resume, as well as the casting of Rooney, since she's considerably more feminine than her Swedish counterpart.
I had to look at this statement a few times because I thought I was reading it wrong. While I was watching the film, Mara seemed so boyish and androgynous, especially compared to Rapace.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#207 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Mon Jan 30, 2012 11:27 pm

Andre Jurieu wrote:The only problem for Fincher is in the casting of Craig, since he naturally exudes a Bond-like machismo with his on-screen persona simply due to his resume
Disagreed, in part because I still remember him most from Road To Perdition and Layer Cake than the Bond films. I can see how it's a problem for others that may have not seen or remembered him well from those performances, and I think it's fair to say he needs to stay out of the action genre, outside of that franchise. He was just a cut-out cliche in Cowboys & Aliens, which pretty much everyone was in that. But this performance to me reminds me of the more down-to-earth characters in those movies I cited earlier (Munich as well).

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Brian C
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#208 Post by Brian C » Mon Jan 30, 2012 11:33 pm

Mr Sausage wrote:What sexual scenarios aren't an adolescent boy's fantasy?

I thought Lisbeth's actions were typical of a victim of abuse. The indiscriminate sexuality, the blunt initiations of sexual acts, the emotional detachment--it all read very differently to me than it did to zedz.
I thought this was true of the Swedish version and Rapace's take on the character. Not so much Mara, who played the role with much more of an emotional attachment to Blomkvist than Rapace.

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Mr Sausage
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#209 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Jan 31, 2012 12:09 am

Brian C wrote:
Mr Sausage wrote:What sexual scenarios aren't an adolescent boy's fantasy?

I thought Lisbeth's actions were typical of a victim of abuse. The indiscriminate sexuality, the blunt initiations of sexual acts, the emotional detachment--it all read very differently to me than it did to zedz.
I thought this was true of the Swedish version and Rapace's take on the character. Not so much Mara, who played the role with much more of an emotional attachment to Blomkvist than Rapace.
That she develops feelings for him is true, but at the moment we're talking about, she's detached and blunt. For the first half of the movie, the only emotions she displays are rage. That subtly shifts as things go on, and we're allowed hints of genuine feeling developing in her, something I thought was commendably handled by Fincher and co.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#210 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Jan 31, 2012 12:19 am

Really? The only emotions she displays are rage? You sound like her social worker.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#211 Post by matrixschmatrix » Tue Jan 31, 2012 12:34 am

I think for a lot of the early parts of the movie we see her totally on her guard (because she's largely around people whom she rightfully doesn't trust) and thus a lot of what she lets out is veiled hatred- and after the horrors, she shows a sort of tough fragility, a desire to regain her feeling of power combined with a sort of post traumatic jumpiness. It's really, really well executed, and went a long way towards justifying showing us the horrors in the first place- she neither shrugs them off as though they were unimportant nor dissolves into victimhood. I felt like dominating Blomquist was one of her coping methods, much as the woman she slept with was- not that she's doing anything wrong, but she's asserting herself to exorcise the feeling of helplessness.

She already knows Blomquist fairly well when they first interact face to face- she's seen more or less all the details of his life, and presumably has a voyeur's grasp on what kind of man she is- but she's still jumpy around him for a while. She sleeps with him when he seems totally helpless, and softens towards him when he has demonstrated that he will do nothing to harm her. There's still an authorial fantasy going on there, but I think it's more a fantasy of being a decent man in a world of monsters, 'one of the good ones', than something pornographic.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#212 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Jan 31, 2012 12:53 am

But rage? 'On her guard' is far from rage, and we see a very sensitive side of her when she visits her longtime guardian. I think it's oversimplification to say the least to imply that she is filled with any sort of rage.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#213 Post by matrixschmatrix » Tue Jan 31, 2012 1:00 am

To me, it's less that she's filled with rage all the time and more that rage is (in some of the early scenes at least) the only emotion she allows herself to show.

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Mr Sausage
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#214 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Jan 31, 2012 1:11 am

mfunk9786 wrote:But rage? 'On her guard' is far from rage, and we see a very sensitive side of her when she visits her longtime guardian. I think it's oversimplification to say the least to imply that she is filled with any sort of rage.
That she has a lot of rage in her is unarguable. When she knocks down the thief on the escalator, she bends over and screams egregiously into his face, a release of emotion whose real object lies elsewhere. And of course there is the torture scene, something which requires an enormous amount of rage (justified to be sure) to put into practice.

For the first half of the movie the only emotion she shows us is rage (barring the rape scene). She doesn't really begin to display more of herself until after she initiates the relationship with Blomkvist. While I am sure she has all sorts of feelings in the first half, we aren't shown them because her manner is detached, which was my point in the first place; and the only thing that breaks through her detachment in the first half is her rage. The movie goes on to hint more at what she's actually feeling, but of course she remains mostly hidden (making her all the more fascinating).

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Andre Jurieu
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#215 Post by Andre Jurieu » Tue Jan 31, 2012 3:53 am

Fiery Angel wrote:
Andre Jurieu wrote:The only problem for Fincher is in the casting of Craig, since he naturally exudes a Bond-like machismo with his on-screen persona simply due to his resume, as well as the casting of Rooney, since she's considerably more feminine than her Swedish counterpart.
I had to look at this statement a few times because I thought I was reading it wrong. While I was watching the film, Mara seemed so boyish and androgynous, especially compared to Rapace.
Yeah, I guess I just think Mara seemed more slight and fragile than Rapace. Plus, Mara's features are a lot more feminine to me. Maybe I'm off on this one since I haven't seen the Swedish version in some time, but Mara just seems to exude more of a conventional concept of femininity.
flyonthewall2983 wrote:Disagreed, in part because I still remember him most from Road To Perdition and Layer Cake than the Bond films. I can see how it's a problem for others that may have not seen or remembered him well from those performances, and I think it's fair to say he needs to stay out of the action genre, outside of that franchise. He was just a cut-out cliche in Cowboys & Aliens, which pretty much everyone was in that. But this performance to me reminds me of the more down-to-earth characters in those movies I cited earlier (Munich as well).
Well, I'm not sure I would lump in his character in Munich with the other two you mentioned earlier, but from what I remember of his performances in Road to Perdition and Layer Cake, I agree that he used to have a more incompetent and docile screen-persona. However, I'm not sure that's really what his established screen persona is at this point in his career. Granted, his version of Bond is far more emotional and vulnerable than prior versions, but the issue is more that his success in the Bond-role has made him somewhat of a sex-symbol to more mainstream audiences. So, while some of us are probably more familiar with his ability to convey a more submissive side of masculinity, it's not difficult to see how some viewers just see this as a convenient excuse for Hollywood filmmakers to have two attractive movie-stars hook up on-screen (as was mentioned above). My point was that Fincher's casting decisions have some problematic elements in conveying the sexual dynamics between the characters when considering the larger audience.

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Lars Von Truffaut
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#216 Post by Lars Von Truffaut » Tue Jan 31, 2012 1:33 pm

zedz wrote:Same here. Fincher and his (great) cast treat the material with far more dignity than it deserves, but all that craft can't paper over the fact that it's little more than a string of meretricious cliches, some of which are borderline-offensive howlers, like the bit where the author's surrogate gets to 'turn' a really hot lesbian. Spare me. And the 'detection' seemed just about as retarded as that in any genre film, with pre-packaged clues sprung like jacks-in-the-box on a plot-demanded basis. (Oh no! My daughter has become a Christian! But yay, she's a Christian who happened to decode those veiled Biblical references pinned to my wall on her one and only visit to my cabin!) That's really par for the course for this sort of film, but it's disappointing given that, in Zodiac, Fincher made one of the rare films that actually takes detection seriously.

So I enjoyed the film, but frankly I'd rather see Fincher devote the next few years of his career to anything other than the two sequels. I suspect this film is as good as this material gets, and I know he's capable of much better.
I thought the film did a fine job of handling their relationship. Just because Lisbeth has a fling with a girl doesn't make her a staunch lesbian (and the book at least, clearly states that she prefers men). From the moment she meets Blomkvist face to face in her apartment we see her gradually letting her guard down, something that for her is extremely rare. As Mr. Sausage mentions, Lisbeth is filled with lots of rage: from the wrong-doing in her childhood, to the way the foster system has screwed her of her independence, as well as the ineptitude of the legal system, etc. Lisbeth made Blomkvist's background check. She knows everything about him "better than his closest friends". She doesn't hide the fact that she feels Blomkvist has been wronged and early on attempts to involve herself in the Wennerstrom affair. Lisbeth does not take on cases she is not interested in and in this situation she takes that to the extreme. Their initial sexual encounter comes at a moment of weakness for Blomkvist, something she can relate to. Mr. Sausage's take on Lisbeth's anger before meeting Blomkvist and the similarities to the lashing out of victim abuse cases is spot on. That isn't to say that Mara's Salander doesn't show a range of emotion, but it does all get funneled back to the initial state of fury. Wisely, Fincher doesn't condescend his audience (unlike Mr. Larsson) and spell everything out for us. He is interested in these two leads and lets them breathe a life of their own in the characters.

Fincher has made it known that he wasn't trying to do a strict adaptation on the book, nor was he relying heavily on the Swedish film as reference. The main reason he made the film was his admiration for the two protagonists. I found Rooney's Lisbeth more feminine, but also more human. Rapace's was good but she played the part as more of a wild animal often to the point where I found some of it to be spastic and at times too actorly (for lack of a better term). The initial sex scene between Rapace and Nyqvist was one of the most awkward and bizarre (and quick) I've ever seen. I also loved the casting choice of Daniel Craig who got to show the flip-side of Bond. I didn't see him as virile at all. He wasn't to timid or modest, but showed an emotional side that Mara could warm to. Michael Nyqvist on the other hand was so sappy. And for a guy who's supposed to be such a ladies man, they could have gone with someone more attractive.

The book has its flaws (many, in my opinion), but Fincher does a fantastic job of paring it down to the key plot points, developing the relationship of the leads, and injecting a necessary bit of humor in the film. Steven Zaillian's script pokes a lot of fun at Larsson's expense. Consider the line as Lisbeth barges in and begins to undress. Blomkvist's "I do have standards" could be a direct dig at the book's handling of the Blomkvist/Cecilia affair, which both films found completely extraneous. Also the t-shirt worn by Lizbeth (Fuck you you fucking fuck) over those in the book ("a black T-shirt with a picture on it of E.T. with fangs, and the words I AM ALSO AN ALIEN" & "Armageddon was yesterday - today we have a serious problem."). While Stieg's version is heavy handed in its MEN ARE ASSHOLES dynamic and lacks any poetic structure, Fincher's attention to visual detail makes the story flow- from the detection to the deaths (swastika cat, anyone). The triple-tiered ending was a bit over long, but the acting (Plummer and Skarsgaard are terrific too!), script, moody music (Reznor and Ross at their best), and cinematography (Cronenweth makes the Vanger estate a character all its own) more than make up for it.

And zedz - as for pre-packaged, jack-in-the box clues and cliches - do we not see the same things in 90+% of Hitchcock films? I know I enjoy Hitch for his characters and his mastery of the directing technique. Not necessarily for his films plots, which I find often have some degree of leakage due to the holes one could constantly shoot through them, if one were so inclined.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#217 Post by zedz » Tue Jan 31, 2012 11:35 pm

Lars Von Truffaut wrote:And zedz - as for pre-packaged, jack-in-the box clues and cliches - do we not see the same things in 90+% of Hitchcock films? I know I enjoy Hitch for his characters and his mastery of the directing technique. Not necessarily for his films plots, which I find often have some degree of leakage due to the holes one could constantly shoot through them, if one were so inclined.
That's a fair comment, but I don't think I'd count any of the offending films among my favourite Hitchcocks. The ones I like best are either not primarily about mystery-solving, have much better conceived detection threads, or really pointedly relegate that sort of heavy plot stuff to the sidelines. For better or worse, Fincher takes his plot seriously in this film. He doesn't camp it up or breeze through it. And for me there's a serious gulf between the care and attention of the treatment and the basically tawdry and slapdash material.

I think we should be grateful that he made a really good film out of what could have been a really bad one, but I sincerely doubt that we'll be looking back on it as a high point of his career in twenty years time.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#218 Post by Andre Jurieu » Wed Feb 01, 2012 1:19 am

zedz wrote: ...but I sincerely doubt that we'll be looking back on it as a high point of his career in twenty years time.
I'm not sure anyone is making that case.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#219 Post by mfunk9786 » Wed Feb 01, 2012 1:33 am

*timidly raises hand*

I think it's pretty firmly his third best film, after Zodiac and Se7en. With all due respect to his fourth, The Social Network

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#220 Post by matrixschmatrix » Wed Feb 01, 2012 2:09 am

Haha, yeah, but you're hardly unbiased- the staring eyes of Rooney Mara won't allow you to rank it lower.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#221 Post by mfunk9786 » Wed Feb 01, 2012 2:12 am

She's so pretty, though

But perfect females aside, the Daniel Craig investigative scenes alone make this film a gem, and a lot of it has to do with the way Fincher has decided to shoot it.

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#222 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Wed Feb 01, 2012 9:15 am

mfunk9786 wrote:*timidly raises hand*

I think it's pretty firmly his third best film, after Zodiac and Se7en. With all due respect to his fourth, The Social Network
1. Zodiac
2. Fight Club (sorry, funk)
3. The Game
4. Social Network
5. This

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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#223 Post by knives » Wed Feb 01, 2012 11:50 am

I'd switch The Game and Fight Club, but yeah that sounds like what I'd say too. Maybe put Seven over The Social Network though.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#224 Post by matrixschmatrix » Wed Feb 01, 2012 11:57 am

I'd say

1. Zodiac
2. Seven
3. Panic Room
4. Fight Club
5. Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
6. The Game
7. Alien 3

Still haven't seen Social Network, and Benjamin Button's probably the one outright failure of Fincher's I have seen.

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Andre Jurieu
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Re: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011)

#225 Post by Andre Jurieu » Wed Feb 01, 2012 11:58 am

Andre Jurieu wrote:
zedz wrote: ...but I sincerely doubt that we'll be looking back on it as a high point of his career in twenty years time.
I'm not sure anyone is making that case.
mfunk9786 wrote:*timidly raises hand*

I think it's pretty firmly his third best film, after Zodiac and Se7en. With all due respect to his fourth, The Social Network
Well, guess I spoke too soon. Please excuse me while I wipe this egg of my face. It's tough to get out after it's dried overnight.

Though, in my defense - however lame it may be - while mfunk has shared some passing thoughts on the movie, considering how apparent his adoration for Mara, Fincher, and the film are, I always got the sense he was building up to some really thorough post outlining why it's worthy to be held alongside Fincher's other great movies. So, maybe I should have stated that "I'm not sure anyone is making that case ... yet." The anticipation builds...

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