The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Series

[huntergrayson]

Somewhat amusingly, I've read Iron Lady's Oscar chances are weak outside of Streep's nom because Academy members don't want to embrace a film about a union-busting politician.

Topic -- from various sources, it seems like Fincher says he approached this film "as a one-off" rather than as part of a trilogy and isn't locked down for the second one even though Sony says its still in the works despite the so-so box office. I honestly don't know who else I'd be interested in seeing handle this material. I can't think of any directors off the top of my head that make me go "oh yeah, they'd be perfect!" - and I think Rooney may struggle playing Lisbeth without his direction.

[Ladybug]

I saw this over the holiday break and thought it was excellent. I liked the performances, and Rooney Mara deserves the accolades that are coming to her. I hate her offscreen attitude, but she gave everything to this and it shows. My only nitpick was the accents. Everyone did the faux Swedish thing, except Daniel Craig just seemed to give up on it about 10 minutes in. Other than that, he was excellent. He has one of the ugliest mugs in Hollywood, IMO, but the man can act and he's sexy as hell so that's just what I focused on.

I thought the film really elevated the source material. Honestly, I found the book a little too exploitative and titilating. Salander is a fantasy woman and there is so much focus on her body and her sex life in the book that I found creepy. Ditto the murders. I thought Fincher's take on the material brought out the true horror of what happened to the women, and he, Zallian, and Mara created a character with more complexity and dimension than Larsson.

I hope that like Zodiac, GWTDT can get a following on DVD.

[huntergrayson]

I highly recommend a British indie called The Mother, which is where I first noticed Craig's fineness. It's a bit disturbing -- he romances a woman twice his age -- but he is incredibly sexy in it.

[Ladybug]

Thanks for the recommendation, huntergrayson, I will check that one out. Not intentionally, but I have seen three Daniel Craig films in the span of a month (Sylvia, Cowboys and Aliens, and now GWTDT) and I'm discovering just what a good actor he is.

[Neurochick]

Hey Hunter, I noticed how hot Daniel Craig was when I saw "Infamous."

I read the first two Dragon Tattoo books and I just wonder if it's worth seeing. My mom wants to see it and wants me to take her. We'll see.

[ross]

The appeal of Daniel Craig completely eludes me, but to be fair as a straight male I'm not exactly the right audience for his sex appeal thing.

What does confuse is how he managed to become a leading man. Skilled character actor sure but not so much screen presence.

[canuckcutie]

Chiming in with the, "excellent movie, thoroughly enjoyed it" camp. I thought Rooney Mara was fantastic. I'm just puzzled as to where the $90mil budget went. Were her nipple piercings gold plated and studded with diamonds? I don't see why they couldn't have made this movie for under $50mil. If the budget were halved then there'd be no hand wringing about it being a flop. It's sitting around the $60mil mark domestic right now and I could see it scrapping across $100mil. I'm surprised it's not doing better box office wise but I do think Sony went nuts with the budget.

[huntergrayson]

Rooney was apparently only paid $200,000. Craig was paid $6 million (only slightly less than his Bond rate - unsurprising, since it was a MGM/Sony film and the only reason he was available was because Bond 23 was delayed).

[ross]

Probably an unpopular opinion but isn't filming large chunks of the film in Sweden itself something of an extravegance?

Perhaps I'm too used to 'British' set films shooting in Ireland for budget reasons.

[Deleted]

They probably spent $20mil just on the hard drives to store everything Fincher shot.