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REVIEW: THE GIRL WHO KICKED THE HORNET'S NEST

post #1 of 31
10/29/10 at 5:40am
Thread Starter 
The Millennium Trilogy goes out with a thud.

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post #2 of 31
10/29/10 at 5:51am
We got the TV versions on DVD over here, and they are very good. They aren't six hours though: the whole trilogy is split into six parts, each of those 90 minutes. so it's 9 hours overall. must mean they cut out quite a lot...
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post #3 of 31
10/29/10 at 6:03am
I don't believe I ever said it was six hours. I'd be interested to see this expanded version of the trilogy. Seems like it might be better than the films, allowing more time for the side characters and such.
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post #4 of 31
10/29/10 at 6:05am
I agree with the review. These films got progressively worse. A shame because I really liked the first one. By the midpoint of the third I simply left the DVD playing and started doing other stuff, trying to catch only the big story beats.
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post #5 of 31
10/29/10 at 6:11am
Quote:
Originally Posted by stelios View Post
I agree with the review. These films got progressively worse. A shame because I really liked the first one. By the midpoint of the third I simply left the DVD playing and started doing other stuff, trying to catch only the big story beats.
At my press screening, the film broke midway through. While it was getting repaired the two people sitting behind me got up and left and never came back. I heard one of them muttering about how she wasn't going to bother reviewing the film. And here I was thinking that I wasn't enjoying it.
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post #6 of 31
10/29/10 at 6:12am
Agreed. I saw this last week and its easily the most boring of the Trilogy. Mainly because Salander is benched in a Hospital Bed/Cell for most of the film. I love Raplace's performance as Salander but the script just doesn't give her much to work with here.

On the other hand, the finale that has Lisbeth against her Odd Job type Half Brother was fun to watch.

(HEAVY SPOILERS!) You wanted to know the differences between the Expanded TV Version and the Movie? Here you go. Warning- Don't read them unless you've watched the first film though.
http://movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=880139
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post #7 of 31
10/29/10 at 10:11am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshua Miller View Post
I don't believe I ever said it was six hours. I'd be interested to see this expanded version of the trilogy. Seems like it might be better than the films, allowing more time for the side characters and such.
My mistake, I completely misread that sentence in the review!
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post #8 of 31
10/29/10 at 10:56am
Nice review, Josh. I agree, sidelining Lisbeth for 75% of the runtime was a dramatic mistake. Assuming that the Fincher version of TATTOO is successful and they make the rest of the trilogy:
- Get Lisbeth healed up faster
- Get her out on 'parole' and have her run away. Have her work on the case concurrently with Blomqvist.
- Have Blomqvist convince her to turn herself in before the trial starts.
Otherwise you totally waste the main character in a passive role.
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post #9 of 31
10/29/10 at 11:13am
Good to know this is a piece of shit even if you have seen the first two.
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post #10 of 31
10/29/10 at 11:20am
Oh, I disagree that it's a piece of shit. It's just not as dynamic as the first two films and just kinda...happens. There's no real tension. I really like how it all ends, though.

Thinking about it more, I really feel that FIRE and HORNETS NEST should be combined into one film. They're already 'part one' and 'part two' of a story (FIRE needs HN to wrap up plot details, and HN needs FIRE to provide setup) that really don't work as standalone films. Combine the two and improve the pace (there's a lot that could be cut out) and you could have a really solid film.
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post #11 of 31
10/29/10 at 3:16pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Judas Booth View Post
Nice review, Josh. I agree, sidelining Lisbeth for 75% of the runtime was a dramatic mistake. Assuming that the Fincher version of TATTOO is successful and they make the rest of the trilogy:
- Get Lisbeth healed up faster
- Get her out on 'parole' and have her run away. Have her work on the case concurrently with Blomqvist.
- Have Blomqvist convince her to turn herself in before the trial starts.
Otherwise you totally waste the main character in a passive role.
Those are good ideas. I would also advise Fincher on another simple alteration...

Have them fucking lose Lisbeth's rape DVD for a while.

That really baffled me while watching the film. They have both copies of Lisbeth's medical records stolen, yet the DVD remains safely in everyone's possession. Fascinating. Seems so obvious.

I also think we should not see as much of our government cabal. Possibly even some of the revelations from PLAYED WITH FIRE should be held back until HORNET'S NEST.
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post #12 of 31
10/29/10 at 3:42pm
I have THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO at home and I've tried to watch it twice. It's really fucking boring. The stuff with Lisbeth is interesting but the rest of it is serious dullsville. I don't get the love. Someone enlighten me.
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post #13 of 31
10/29/10 at 3:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sebastian OB View Post
I have THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO at home and I've tried to watch it twice. It's really fucking boring. The stuff with Lisbeth is interesting but the rest of it is serious dullsville. I don't get the love. Someone enlighten me.
Thank Christ. I thought I was the only one who wasn't in love with that movie. I could have watched a movie that was far more Lisbeth-centered since her story is interesting and Rapace is a compelling actress but I really didn't give a shit at all about the core mystery of the film. My wife is reading the books and on her suggestion I'll probably do the same since they sound far, far more detail-oriented and tied together than the movies are.

Maybe keeping the details behind why Blomqvist agrees to take the case, so to speak, congruous between novel and film would have helped the film feel like it had a genuine purpose. Maybe it still wouldn't have mattered much.
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post #14 of 31
10/29/10 at 4:00pm
Major fucking yawn, this one is. I don't get it. The first was at least a passable entertainment, with plenty of grit to keep one entertained. This one (and to a slightly lesser degree, the second part) was like watching C-SPAN on Valium. While the story is very intriguing, there is nothing really cinematic about this installment. Hopefully Fincher can remedy this.
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post #15 of 31
10/29/10 at 4:20pm
The shadowy, secret evil organization was so incredibly fucking lame. Just a cabal of creaky old men who... hired guys to throw bricks, and that one incompetent assassination attempt. Terrible villains.
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post #16 of 31
10/29/10 at 4:31pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Renn Brown View Post
The shadowy, secret evil organization was so incredibly fucking lame. Just a cabal of creaky old men who... hired guys to throw bricks, and that one incompetent assassination attempt. Terrible villains.
Plus we have that other group of characters from the government working to take down our tiny cabal, completely defeating the entire purpose of having a silly government cabal... the sense that you can't possibly win against such a powerful, wide-reaching foe. As it was, it really just seemed like a matter of time until the truth came out - regardless of what Blomkvist did.

EDIT: And I think the first film is a perfectly acceptable (if extremely rote) mystery-thriller. Maybe I'd be saying different if I paid $12 to see it in the theater, but it made a solid Netflix Instant Watch.
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post #17 of 31
10/29/10 at 4:41pm
I have to agree with Josh on 'Tattoo'. My wife and I really enjoyed that one, and our enjoyment of it probably made us both go easier than we should have on 'Fire' and 'Hornets Nest'.
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post #18 of 31
10/29/10 at 4:42pm
Yeah, I think I'm just a victim of having Tattoo overhyped to me. I haven't gotten to the rape yet though, maybe the rape will really bump things up a notch for me. Things go better with rape.
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post #19 of 31
10/29/10 at 5:08pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sebastian OB View Post
Yeah, I think I'm just a victim of having Tattoo overhyped to me. I haven't gotten to the rape yet though, maybe the rape will really bump things up a notch for me. Things go better with rape.
Be aware that they made it clear both during the rape scene and afterwards that she got raped in the ass. HARD. It's a hard scene to watch but it does make her 'revenge' scene all the more satisfying.

My wife enjoyed the film but had a hard time with all of the violence towards women.
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post #20 of 31
10/29/10 at 10:48pm
Interestingly, the original title of the first book translates to MEN WHO HATE WOMEN.
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post #21 of 31
10/30/10 at 11:24am
Mr Miller,

I just need to say that this is the best review I've read since Devin's departure from CHUD. I hope you'll be tapped for more reviews in the future.
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post #22 of 31
10/30/10 at 12:18pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sebastian OB View Post
I have THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO at home and I've tried to watch it twice. It's really fucking boring. The stuff with Lisbeth is interesting but the rest of it is serious dullsville. I don't get the love. Someone enlighten me.
I think I may have been the lone voice of dissent in the thread for the original. It's so goddamn boring, the structure and pacing are just horrible, and the fucking thing ends at least three times. The idea that these films actually got worse is too mind-blowing a concept for me to fathom.
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post #23 of 31
10/30/10 at 1:57pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by JacknifeJohnny View Post
The idea that these films actually got worse is too mind-blowing a concept for me to fathom.
Ha.

I am curious to see how many Best of 2010 lists the first film winds up on.
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post #24 of 31
10/30/10 at 3:15pm
Nononono. Even the first one has no place in any best of the year lists.
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post #25 of 31
10/30/10 at 5:47pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by stelios View Post
Nononono. Even the first one has no place in any best of the year lists.
Maybe it is just a testament to how shitty the first half of 2010 was, but I feel like a lot of people were over the moon for it.
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post #26 of 31
10/30/10 at 7:17pm
My story is much the same. I tried to watch it a couple of times, and lost interest. I looked at the thread here a few times, and enough people were saying they thought it was great, and especially when Fleed said he watched it with his sister and liked it. That's when I decided to hunker down and really pay atttention to it. I liked it plenty, but not nearly enough for a top ten list.
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post #27 of 31
10/30/10 at 7:47pm
I enjoyed Dragon Tattoo, but once it was finished I said to my friend "Fincher can definitely improve on this."

I'm not sure I'm going to bother with the sequels, I'll just wait for the remake. And from what I've heard the books are about on the level of a Dan Brown novel, as far as writing goes, so I won't even bother with those.
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post #28 of 31
10/30/10 at 8:20pm
The thing is, the second and third movies weren't planned to get theatrical release - they were movies made for TV, as was the whole trilogy, in fact. They did put more effort into film one, however, as that one was going to be released on cinemas. When it became known that part II & III would not be put on the big screen here in Sweden, there was a lot of headlines and a lot of public bitching and eventually, they simply decided to release the whole trilogy cinematically, editing lots of they had shot to better fit the length of a normal feature film (and delaying when it would be airing, no doubt).

I think it shows the latter parts are made for TV, so many close-ups and shots of people sipping coffee or doing very little at all (yes, I know they drink coffee in every other scene in the books, but had these been films made for cinematic release, they might have trimmed these moments down a bit more), etc.

Think of it when or if you have a look at these movies again, that they were primarily targeted for being shown on TV, that really, only the first one was considered for cinematic release, and you might understand why the quality drops. Even disregarding the whole thing about Salander being hospitalized for such an extended period, which is from the novel.
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post #29 of 31
10/30/10 at 8:50pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Borg View Post
The thing is, the second and third movies weren't planned to get theatrical release - they were movies made for TV, as was the whole trilogy, in fact. They did put more effort into film one, however, as that one was going to be released on cinemas. When it became known that part II & III would not be put on the big screen here in Sweden, there was a lot of headlines and a lot of public bitching and eventually, they simply decided to release the whole trilogy cinematically, editing lots of they had shot to better fit the length of a normal feature film (and delaying when it would be airing, no doubt).

I think it shows the latter parts are made for TV, so many close-ups and shots of people sipping coffee or doing very little at all (yes, I know they drink coffee in every other scene in the books, but had these been films made for cinematic release, they might have trimmed these moments down a bit more), etc.

Think of it when or if you have a look at these movies again, that they were primarily targeted for being shown on TV, that really, only the first one was considered for cinematic release, and you might understand why the quality drops. Even disregarding the whole thing about Salander being hospitalized for such an extended period, which is from the novel.
I don't think that is much of an excuse. Possibly the filmmakers put less money into the second two productions (though I didn't notice a dramatic drop in production values), but my understanding is that the adaptations remained quite faithful. So I don't really see how being intended as TV movies explains away any of the film's problems. The RED RIDING TRILOGY was not intended to be theatrical either, but those filmed played just dandy. HORNET'S NEST's story itself isn't cinematic; that is the bigger issue, not the presentation.

Ultimately I think it is unfair to bag on the films too much, as the real problems seem to stem from the books themselves. So in a sense, the movies' biggest crime was being TOO faithful.
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post #30 of 31
10/30/10 at 8:59pm
I can vouch on the fidelity of the books. Even the Boxer vs Nierdeman scene in THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE is in the books as well. They scapped some of the Blomvist love affairs but on the whole most of the essential points are in the films.
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post #31 of 31
11/4/10 at 7:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joshua Miller View Post
I don't think that is much of an excuse. Possibly the filmmakers put less money into the second two productions (though I didn't notice a dramatic drop in production values), but my understanding is that the adaptations remained quite faithful. So I don't really see how being intended as TV movies explains away any of the film's problems. The RED RIDING TRILOGY was not intended to be theatrical either, but those filmed played just dandy. HORNET'S NEST's story itself isn't cinematic; that is the bigger issue, not the presentation.

Ultimately I think it is unfair to bag on the films too much, as the real problems seem to stem from the books themselves. So in a sense, the movies' biggest crime was being TOO faithful.
I agree, but I think that had they been produced as movies, they would've had to trim a lot of fat from the books and make some changes. You could make something cinematic out of Hornet's Nest, but it'd take a talented screenwriter and a topnotch director to pull it off... and frankly, I'd rather see that imaginary talented screenwriter and topnotch director work on something more compelling.

Now, it was a while since I saw the films (the last one was released about a year ago over here), but I thought part II and III felt sloppy and unfocused, which most likely comes from them being made primarily for TV and only edited for cinematic release as an afterthought (or because of pressure after the success of the first film). Men Who Hate Women (or The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo) was OK - at least it was more focused.

Fincher could probably turn the trilogy into something special, but it's good he'll only make TGWtDT so he can start working on something more compelling soon. Anyway, that's a discussion for a different thread.
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