This is only half of what might be a great movie.
The second installment of the Millenium Trilogy, The Girl Who Played with Fire, is not a stand-alone movie. It follows in the footsteps of other sequels that have already planned and written third pictures like ‘Matrix Reloaded’ and ‘Back to the Future II’ in that it sets up much more than it is willing to pay off. There is much exposition introduced into the plot here, amongst them a clandestine sex ring, a corrupt police force, and a considerable amount of names and locations that don’t have the called-for impact on the climax of the story. I would almost recommend that you don’t see this movie until the third installment comes out on DVD, and then you should watch the two movies together as a double feature. I say ‘almost’ because I don’t know yet whether the third installment will pay-off the buildup of the second. I hope so. We will see shortly. The third movie comes out this fall.
The movie starts off a year later after the first movie, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, ended. Lisbeth Salander, played by Noomi Rapace, returns to Sweden from vacation only to realize that someone has framed her for triple-murder. One victim was her guardian from the original movie and the other two were new members of her journalist buddy Mikael Blomkvist’s team. The journalists were investigating a sex trafficking ring. Apparently all three of the murders were related and most of the movie consists of Salander and Blomkvist trying to find out who did it. The movie stays true to the realistic journalistic procedures that were on display in the first movie. Having said that, this is where the movie bogs down for a while. Many Swedish names are thrown about and lots of people are introduced. At times it was hard to keep track of everybody and the fact that everything was in Swedish did not help much.
Another disappointing thing about this movie is that Lisbeth and Blomkvist spend the entire movie completely apart from each other. I especially liked their dynamic in the original and felt it was missed here. The new bad guys also don’t rise to the devilish of the family of Nazis in the first, but are still pretty scary. One of them is this huge blonde bodybuilder who has a rare disease that makes him impervious to pain. The other is Lisbeth’s dad. You may remember him as the guy she lit on fire in the flashback at the end of the first movie. What do you call it when a daughter wants to kill her father? It’s not an Oedipal complex. Did the Greeks have a name for that?
Lisbeth Salander continues to be one of the most compelling characters I have ever seen and Noomi Rapace’s performance, from the movies I have seen this year, should garner a couple of Oscar nominations. So much of the movie consists of Lisbeth investigating alone that most of Rapace’s acting is silent facial expressions. Now since Lisbeth Salander is such a stoic character, Rapace has a very tough job. She has to convey what Salander is feeling while at the same time keeping the character very controlled. Somehow she does perfectly. That face! It is one of the most captivating things I’ve ever watched. You know what Screen Presence is: When the character has a nude scene and I’m still more interested in what’s going on with her eyes. Now, that’s Screen Presence. The best performance by an actress I have seen so far this year is Rapace in “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.” The second best performance by an actress I have seen so far this year is Rapace in “The Girl Who Played with Fire.”
The movie does a rather cool thing in that it allows its heroine to not only be small but also look small. This is a rare thing in movies. Sure you have diminutive actors like Tom Cruise and Matt Damon running around, but the movie will usually employ some tricks to make them look taller than they actually are. For instance you can lower the camera, use close-ups instead of long shots, or cast an even shorter side-kick or bad guy. If the love interest is not a head shorter than the hero, he’s a small guy. That’s how you tell. In contrast, this movie seems to want to make it a point as to how small Salander is. They shoot her in wide shots so you can see all of her, they cast a taller woman to be her love interest, and the bad guy is an even bigger hulk. They even show her sitting on a kitchen counter in one scene. Her feet don’t touch the ground for chrissakes. (That’s no way to treat an action hero!) Actually I really like this and I like the look in Rapace’s eyes when she is about to fight a guy twice her size. There’s understandable fear not macho zeal there. This makes the movie all the more suspenseful. We feel afraid with Salander and wonder how she is going to get out of the mess she’s in. The fact that the heroine is small and knows it just makes the character that much braver and thus more likable. Perhaps we can allow male action heroes to look small someday. But I ask too much.
The climax of the story reminded me of a bloodied, sweaty, and dirty Bruce Willis walking down the hallway screaming “Hans!” in the original ‘Die Hard.’ Like in that movie, the heroine here is allowed to (dare I say) not look pretty for a scene. Again I really liked it. That Noomi Rapace! She’s such a badass! The next movie comes out this fall. I eagerly await it.
p.s. Rooney Mara has just been cast in the American version. That she is unknown is perhaps for the best.
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