Calm down, kids, "Dragon Tattoo" is not a masterpiece! I quite enjoyed it, tough

Rating: Null/10 (27 January 2012)

Sometimes the hype for something gives you the excitement and the anticipation. But sometimes what happens is the exact opposite. I didn't believe the hype for anything THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO. I stayed away from the books, the Swedish films and the American version. I read in twitter someone who was like "this is the very first time I ain't rushing to see a David Fincher film in its opening day". While I'm not crazy about Fincher, I do love most of his stuff. And since ZODIAC (from 2007) I have been there, with great expectation, for the new Fincher picture. "Dragon Tattoo" was the exception for me too; I just wasn't waiting for it. But after all, I did ended watching it on the big screen during its first week in my city! My sister (a huge fan of the books) went to the opening day on Friday, loved it and then took me to the cinema yesterday. * Did you like it? * Of course when the credits rolled she asked me that. The first thing I said to her was that it was really damn long, but that yes, I did like it.
Let me be clear: "Dragon Tattoo" is not a masterpiece. It's very enjoyable, but for all the kids who were truly impressed I will have the following few words: calm the f*** down, I have seen this many times before and I have seen better (from Fincher himself)! Hell, I even thought this was some sort of KILL BILL as more than just one person (especially the women) was praising a lot the " fearless girl getting revenge of a pig f****** man" thing. But that actually is just a small part of the film. Pretty much it's a subplot of a subplot, if that makes sense. We have like two different films going on. The film of Daniel Craig's character Mikael and the film of Rooney Mara's character Lisbeth. The first one is a classic murder mystery story
I'm a huge sucker for this kind of murder mystery thing and I really loved some of the elements. The setting is classic. I think the last time I watched something similar was in THE GHOST WRITER by Roman Polanski: main character leaves home (here Mikael travels to an island in Sweden) do a extremely well-paid job for one man; he settles there and of course there will be some strange things mystery, it is. The whole thing going on in the island is quite interesting, and it works: it's an island that is owned by a family of powerful businessmen, and also some former Nazis. And pretty much there's not great communication between them. Anyway, my only problem with this whole setting was the language thing. I guess it was a difficult situation for Fincher, and I appreciated (even as a guy who, like I said, haven't read the books nor watch the Swedish film trilogy) the fact that he didn't move the story to, for instance, the US (think in LET ME IN). It would have not been the same. But then again, why not at least have the supporting Swedish characters speaking nothing less than Swedish? I would have loved that for sure.
And on the other hand there's the central figure of the film: the girl with the dragon tattoo. Miss Rooney Mara, I applaud you. I didn't even realize she was the same actress with the small yet important role in Fincher's previous feature THE SOCIAL NETWORK! Her character is, as needed, very likable. I guess the thing I enjoyed most of this film was that it builds the two most important characters by separated and when they finally meet all the expectations are covered. I mean, we know we are watching everything for that important thing that is their meeting. It's a great kind of entertainment, with Craig and Mara really on fire. Think in SE7EN. There's brutal stuff here too (about rapists, serial killers and the Bible – and yes, the word Bible fits perfect in that sentence!). Even tough our two detectives are actually a journalist and a hacker, there's great police stuff too (with Macbooks and scanned old photos everywhere). However, and sadly, the film eventually drags a bit, and falls to be pretty ordinary. And ordinary may not be the problem but just that there's nothing brilliantly shocking anymore. Something's missing, and that something is a key factor for not having me rushing in order to see the Swedish trilogy or read the books.
*Watched it on the big screen on January 25, 2012