Kind of a decent by-the-numbers mystery caper

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2011)

David Fincher in recent years has grown to become one of America's best known directors working today. He has an interesting, oftentimes dark visual style that he features, and usually he has an interesting story to tell. Unfortunately, in this film, the story is just not interesting enough. It's kind of a typical murder mystery film, with some twists and turns, and an ending that really isn't too shocking. What raises this up from being completely mediocre is Rooney Mara's performance as the title character. Otherwise, this story here doesn't have enough weight or originality to stand out over other pretty good mystery films.
Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) is a journalist who's fallen out of favor after possible slanderous reporting. He is called upon by Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer), the ex- CEO of a company, to solve the mystery of his missing and presumed dead niece who disappeared 40 years ago. He ends up being partnered with an anti-social computer hacker, Lisbeth (Rooney Mara), who uses her skill and research to help solve the case.
Mikael and Lisbeth ("The girl with the dragon tattoo") don't meet up until halfway through the film, and the first half features them each working separately. All the scenes in the first half of the film focusing on Lisbeth are very interesting. While Mikael gets immediately thrown into the main story, Lisbeth is given almost a character study (that furthers along the plot) for the first half of the film. Rooney Mara is really great here, giving the character layers, with such understated acting. The character is emotionally disturbed and apparently "crazy" but any trait is hidden beneath this straight and unflinching face. Daniel Craig's character, on the other hand, is not nearly as interesting, and for some reason, he mumbles here a lot, so he's also hard to understand at times. The mystery he's trying to solve is interesting conceptually, but visually it's often hard to convey excitement when he's sitting alone reading up on research.
When the characters finally meet, about 75 minutes into this 160 minute behemoth, the mystery story gels a bit more, mainly because Daniel Craig finally has someone interesting to interact with. Where the film is lacking is largely in the story. The revelation at the end as to the connections of murders, and potential villains aren't that interesting. The resolution of the film must take darned near 30 minutes, and the main thing I took away from the film, was what a great performance Ms. Mara gave, and what an interesting character she played. The plot is by-the-numbers mystery, and the film does at times drag. David Fincher's direction is alright, but he doesn't make researching the murder much more than mundane. He throws in a few disorienting movements of the camera's placement, but other than that, this doesn't feel like a really great David Fincher directed film. It feels more like an O.K. mystery thriller, that has a great performance, some tense moments, and overall just kind of slips out of one's memory after a while.
This film isn't bad by any means, it just doesn't have enough going for it to make it anything more than somewhat generic, other than the character of Lisbeth. It is overlong, though not bloated, and really not a lot could have been cut out without either cutting the story, or getting rid of good character scenes. The mystery is sort of interesting, but not nearly engaging enough. The final scene in the film was very good however, and mixed character development with a sort of sadness, giving the film a bittersweet feeling. The title character basically saves this film, and rises it above mediocrity, though not quite enough above.
My rating: ** 1/2 out of ****. 160 mins. R for violence, sexuality and brief nudity.