The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

If I compare the procedural ritual Zodiac and this sexless genre trap, it's clear that Fincher was doing a studio job. Nordic detectives are not cool. They're really weird. This version was unable to capture this at all. The investigation is secondary here, and what makes it twice as bad given that it’s Fincher - any pathological charge slips away here. The fact that the killer listens to Enya is a weak band-aid. Anal sex in the form in which the film offers it can really outrage only unbroken Catholics, and there were more places where I searched in vain for Fincher's contribution. Personally, I suffered through most of the film - and something tells me that if you don't know the book, some of the things won't make sense (for a detective story, the motivations of the killer and the detective are quite crucial, which are hardly found here). (12/01/2012)

A nice mainstream fairy tale. The humor and story work even if haven’t read the book or seen the original trilogy. It wasn’t that long ago that Hollywood found it necessary to update and rewrite Japanese and other horror flicks, but if it's currently fashionable to remake Swedish films, I'm somewhat more sympathetic to that. Lisbeth Salander is a girl that contemporary mass pop culture can't do without, so why not be happy that her series is good? Fincher doesn't always suit my tastes, I don't seek out Craig, and I wouldn't have thought Rooney Mara would be capable of such a personality after the Facebook girl. I'm very fond of Stellan Skarsgård this year and Christopher Plummer is king, but the person who is a downright joy to see on screen is the ethereal being Joely Richardson. I need to see Joely more often, and I'm very much in the mood for a little marathon with the original Lisbeth - and that's exactly the effect the film was supposed to have. (12/01/2012)

My slight disappointment stems paradoxically from my ignorance of the book, which is obviously not very suitable for filming. This is because the quantity of names becomes annoying after a while, although otherwise, Fincher does great work as usual in all other components, so we do get a great soundtrack (but this time it's too "off the charts" for the Oscar race:)), excellent cinematography (which underlines the pedantic narrative), and precise actors. But I'll definitely go see it again. The fact that the gardener is the murderer will soon dawn on even the slower folks, but that's beside the point. How we get there is the first priority this time. Fincher is the best director alive right now, period. (16/01/2012)

Much better than the Swedish film, much more faithful to the book, with much better chosen actors... I didn't expect that. The biggest asset of Fincher's version (which is by no means a remake of the film, but a new version of the original) is Rooney Mara, who plays Lisbeth Salander. She looks much weirder than Noomi Rapace and gives a much more inscrutable impression, throwing completely irresistible blank stares - she's just great. Daniel Craig plays second fiddle, but he plays it like a virtuoso. The casting of the other roles is also successful without exception, I was very pleased with Robin Wright, and I was also impressed by the performance of the lieutenant Bjurman. David Fincher evoked a very gloomy atmosphere from the very beginning (the credits must have cost as much as a Czech TV movie) and didn't let it go until the end, whilst the screenwriter (unlike the one who messed up the Swedish film) managed to squeeze everything important into two and a half hours, not strangely twisting anything and leaving out only things I could have done without in the book. To deduct stars from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for being "just" a mere genre film would be silly. (23/10/2013)

An atmospheric illustration of a subordinate storyline from the novel; nothing more, nothing less. On one hand it is terribly little for Fincher (a special aspect of his preceding five adaptations of novels was that he always used his own interpretation and viewpoint, and Larsson offers much in this respect; too bad that he cut it down to this unimportant thrilleroid part), on the other it must be said that there are illustrations by nobodys and illustrations like those by Zdeněk Burian, which enrich the original story and become inseparable. And, in the same way that Craig is Blomkvist and Mara is Lisbeth (although an utterly different Lisbeth than Noomi), this is Burian. And yes, Fincher is still the same formal pedant under whom Reznor is growing into one of the timeless greats. Just Enya, removed of innocence once and for all, disappointed. (12/01/2012)