Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Girl with the dragon tattoo

We only watched this DVD because a friend of mine put it in our mail box and emailed me to say how much he enjoyed the movie. I don't normally bother with thrillers, and if I'd known there would be a violent rape scene and images of brutalized female murder victims,  I probably wouldn't have put it on the other night.

Having said that (and having got the boy to fast-forward past the anal rape), it was otherwise a good movie. It was not your standard cookie-cutter Hollywood thriller in which lots of women get to be murder victims - maybe because it's a Swedish film based on a Swedish novel.

What saved it for me was a) that there were plot twists that the boy didn't spot within the first five minutes, and b) the person who is instrumental in finding the evil murdering bastard and in making sure he gets his justice is a woman (that's the tattooed girl I'm talking about). 

The "girl" is undoubtedly troubled, with a history of mental illness and violence - but when you find out what her childhood was like, it's really not surprising. She's a professional hacker. Your eyes are probably rolling at yet another computer hacker youngster in a movie - but the boy (who is, as you know, a computer whisperer) declared her geekisms completely authentic.

Oh yeah, and there's a non-evil man in the movie too. But in this universe they are a rare species.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh I had wondered what the movie was like. We've read all the books (and thoroughly enjoyed them even though they are a wee bit trashy). So had thought the movie might be a bit of a let down but maybe will give a whirl.

Although yes can imagine the anal rape scene probably not v. pleasant!

april said...

Loved the book, and the second one too (third not out in the US yet). I'll have to give the movie a try.

LK said...

Am actually too nervous to read the book or watch the movie, as good as I've heard they are I'm just not sure I'll manage the violent stuff.

Violet said...

I've not read the books - thrillers aren't really my thing, though I'm not a big fiction reader anyway. But rape scenes are a definite turn off and guaranteed to haunt me unpleasantly.

Watson Woodworth said...

Never saw it but I'm not very good with screen-cruelty.
It was literally years before I ever saw the end of Shallow Grave.

Violet said...

nigel: I'm not either. I saw Shallow Grave when it was on at the movies, but I don't remember anything about it.