The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (Luftslottet som sprängdes, 2009)

[randy_byers]

Eh. This is the concluding movie in the adaptation of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy, about a tormented goth girl genius and the ugly underbelly of Swedish society. It wraps the story up, but it's by the numbers. We find out who was responsible for Lisbeth Salander's mistreatment as a child and young adult, and why they did it. As hinted previously, it's a right wing conspiracy, but a strangely toothless one. Despite a couple of interesting characters and a few good scenes, there wasn't much drama or suspense to it. Good defeats evil, yay! Probably the most interesting thing about it continued to be Lisbeth's inability to relate to other human beings, but even that felt a bit rote here. On some level this chapter is about her dependence on others to help her despite her inability to trust or understand anyone, but it never really explores the dimensions of that.

Still worth seeing as the conclusion of the story, but kind of a damp squib in its own right.

Comments

[daveon.livejournal.com]

I suspect that the denouement in the trial and the performance by Blomkvist's sister lacks something in translation to the screen. We're going to see it on Sunday.

I suspect a lot of nuance wasn't just lost in the translation to the screen but also from Swedish to English.

I read most of it on the plane back from PV and I laughed outloud at the performance of the baddies in spaces. I think Larsson was making some points about his opinion of the Swedish Security forces - even though, at the end of the day, they're actually heroes.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

This is a Swedish movie, so you can't blame the translation. However, I'm sure that the movie had to simplify the novel quite a bit. The trial is practically a cartoon, with new evidence tossed unexpectedly into the middle of the proceedings to confuse and confound the bad guys. The evil psychiatrist is a bit too much of a mustache-twirler. More interesting are the evil old right wing conspiracy guys who are all limping around with canes and cancer and kidney dialysis machines. The movie just doesn't make enough of it. There doesn't seem to be anything at stake other than filling in the backstory and tying up loose plotlines. In fact, it almost played like a top-level summary of the plot (pun intended).

[daveon.livejournal.com]

There's quite a lot in the book about how the right wing conspiracy started and the key dude bemoaning how they've all gone soft since he retired.

My worry for this movie was that nothing actually happens apart from the court scene - it's mostly 300 pages of putting pieces into positions around the board ready for everything to fall apart during the court scene.

The psychiatrist is *meant* to be charming and renowned as an expert, if he comes over as a characterture then that's sloppy film making.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

My worry for this movie was that nothing actually happens apart from the court scene - it's mostly 300 pages of putting pieces into positions around the board ready for everything to fall apart during the court scene.

Yes, that's a problem for the movie, especially because the trial itself didn't generate any feeling of uncertainty about the outcome for me. The best thing about the trial was Lisbeth's goth punk look. Very stylish.

Now that I've lowered your expectations, I imagine you'll find the movie better than you thought it would be!

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

hmm, worrying,as i thought the second duller than the first but the thrd a stormer. But generally i've preferred the books to the films. I may just wait & see what Daniel Craig makes of it all..

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

I've seen a number of reviewers who thought this movie was a lot better than the second, if not quite as good as the first (which had a different director than the second two). About evenly split with those who thought this one was a dud.

[bovil.livejournal.com]

Well, "Millennium" wasn't planned to be a trilogy. Larrson just died before he could write more installments.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

It's true that he intended to write more books in the series and had done a lot of work on the fourth. I've seen the trilogy terminology used elsewhere and just went with the flow, perhaps misleadingly. I figured he planned the first three books as a self-contained trilogy at the beginning of a longer series.

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

Is this out?? Bleeding hell -\not here yet..