It's okay....

Rating: 3/10 (30 May 2011)

Ever had the feeling that everyone is saying how good a film is - and you just don't feel that way AT ALL?
Well, that is how I feel about this film (and the book as well for that matter)
Look, it is a good film. However, it is just that: an okay film
It has some excellent things going for it - the cinematography, some of the acting. But the eponymous girl with the tattoo is so over the top that it all verges on cartoon somehow.
One of the things I most love about reading a book and watching a film or a TV programme, is the suspension of disbelief. You go into the narrative and lose yourself in it.
So it pains me to say that there is one major narrative revelation here that just angered me SO MUCH. .....and again, I did say SPOILER ALERT so stop reading please if you don't know about this story yet....OR if you love this film with a passion.
Sorry, but just can't - no matter how I try - to understand the choice here to choose to discover a serial killer and then have what is likely one of the most horrific death counts for a murderer, to be made irrelevant to the lead character's bid to 'find out the truth of corruption.' Also, there is a woman who the audience is expected to feel compassion for. This woman who knew more than anyone that said serial killer was always a complete fruit cake with sadistic tendencies. Did she send even an anonymous letter to the police to keep an eye on this bloke? In the same way she sent the flowers to her uncle?? Managed to do that anonymously didn't she?
Nup. She didn't. None of it adds up. .....and I say this from a veteran of English police drama's.
Realise I am in the minority here. If you love it, good on you. Just cannot get past that airbrushing of mass murder.