Barely a shadow of the original

Rating: 2/10 (24 March 2012)

The original screen play with Michael Nyqvist and Noomi Rapace, even with subtitles was riveting throughout. I cannot recall any movie that I was unable to put down like I found the first movie to be.
This movie did endeavor to be different. Maybe it was closer to the book, I did not read it so I do not know. It had some great names in it and much larger budget but it was very unfortunately a typical mediocre Hollywood product. Neither controversial or memorable. A centrist effort to gain a predictable market return.
I give good credit to Daniel Craig and especially Rooney Mara. He gave a credible effort and Rooney clearly put her all into the role. Where this movie failed was the screen play (dialog) and directing. Rooney and Daniel were constricted by poor dialog and inconsistent personality development. A shallow and obvious presentation where the original movie was a subtle and complexly layered plot and character relationships.
The biggest absence was the development of the relationship between Lisbeth and Mikel. For half they movie they do not even meet. None of the interplay that introduced Lisbeth and Mikel in the original was even attempted in the remake. After a brief time together the both say "how they like working together" ?? What? How obvious and hollow. Mikel's daughter earlier blurts out that the codes are Leviticus passages. Lisbeth's superior brain looses the opportunity to figure this out. Lisbeth didn't even kill Martin in the end, we do not know if she would have. All the dumbing down of the key heroine and smoothing of the rough edges made the remake a sad and sorry shadow of the original.
The remake was not as much a Hollywood capitalist venture as much as it is a statement of how arrogant US film makers have become to remake a movie not two years old. DO ignore the glowing reviews that were conspicuously offered FIRST. They must have known they needed to stack the deck to make some money from this mess.
It wasn't as bad as I feared it may be, it was worse. I hope to never have to see it again, even by accident.