***This article contains some spoilers and some images that are NSFW. Don’t be caught looking at NSFW images, you could get fired! Read on at your own discretion. ~Sincerely, Rammfan518***
Hello there, all.
Back in August, I bought the first book of Stieg Larsson’s “Millenium Trilogy”, titled “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” (Swedish original title, “Män som hatar kvinnor”, translates to “Men Who Hate Women”). I read the first twenty pages and became swept up in studies. It wasn’t until Decemeber break that I went back to that yellow, green, and orange book and began to read again. Within a month, I had read all three of the books and seen all three of the Swedish film adaptations.
The Swedish films were pretty good. They remained as faithful to the books as they could, even if it seemed like a glorified video version of Cliff Notes (754 page book into a two hour movie is hard!). Even though it felt a bit quick, you have to commend the films for remaining mostly faithful to books, only taking shortcuts with the narrative when pressed for time.
When I learned they were making American versions of the film, I groaned with the rest of the Swedish-adaptation fanboys. My annoyance was slightly lessened when I found out it was to be directed by David Fincher, fresh off “The Social Network” (which was my favorite movie of last year). I was a bit excited to see what Fincher had to bring to the table, even though I still thought we had completely adequate adaptations anyway.
We were first given two pieces of news. The first of which is the image below, a cover for W with Rooney Mara posing as Lisbeth Salander:
It looks alright. Can’t really do much complaining here except for the huge “SALANDER” tattoo across her chest. I’ll admit I don’t remember everything about Lisbeth’s tattoos, but I do remember there was one of a dragon on her back (duh) and one of a wasp. I don’t remember anything about a “Salander” tattoo, and judging from the relationships with the people in her family, I don’t think she would get one, especially not all over her chest. Perhaps this was just photoshopped on for the cover of the magazine to help us know who was on the cover.
The second bit of news we heard that day was that the ending had changed from the book, which was news to send me into a nerd rage. Here is the statement below from some movie person:
“The script, which captures the novel’s bleak tone, was written by Academy Award winner Steven Zaillian, who wrote Schindler’s List, and it departs rather dramatically from the book. Blomkvist is less promiscuous, Salander is more aggressive, and, most notably, the ending — the resolution of the drama — has been completely changed.
This may be sacrilege to some, but Zaillian has improved on Larsson — the script’s ending is more interesting.”
Ansiktepalm, I say. I know that you can’t stay completely original to anything when adapting it, but good god, it’s not REQUIRED to change things, let alone the ENDING. I don’t really know if I like anyone saying that Zaillian has “improved” on Larsson. I mean, Larsson’s the author of the original material, can he really be improved on? Can original material be improved upon if that is indeed the original material? I’m just wondering what kind of ending the movie-makers have come up with. I hope it’s not some sort of “Oh, she’s really your mother!” or “Daniel Craig is really your father!” or some stupid reveation-shit like that. That would blow. I also hope that the criminal, the man behind all the mysterious stuff, remains the same, but that probably won’t happen either.
Such news about the changing of the plot sent me into a nerd rage for a couple weeks. Eventually I calmed down, because, y’know, it’s only a movie. A while later, this image was released, another one of Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander:
Ok. . .but why is she topless? That makes absolutely no sense.
Then about a week ago, the first teaser for Fincher’s version was released. It is posted down below.
I don’t know how to feel about this. I mean, on one hand, I love David Fincher, Daniel Craig, Stellan Skarsgård, and Trent Reznor’s music was amazing in “The Social Network”. While all this is something to look forward to, I can’t help but think that this is just a louder, busier, more obnoxious version of the Swedish adaptation. (American remakes = obnoxious, less deep, less funny, marketable to dumbasses).
I received the trailer with a relative “meh” and went about LOOKING FOR A DAMN JOB. While being unemployed yesterday, I saw an image of one of the posters going around the UK. It’s posted below:
Are you fucking serious? What are they trying to sell me? A movie or boobs? Why is that nearly every picture released of Ms. Mara as Lisbeth either has her 1) showing her boobs or 2) being topless? A friend of mine (who’s not a Larsson fanboy) said commented that this poster tells him nothing about the film except that it has boobs in it, maybe. Does anyone else find it, I don’t know, a bit tasteless as well that Mrs. Salander is SPOILER AHEAD IN ITALICS is a rape victim? In the first book, her guardian Nils Bjurman rapes her quite roughly. Even though she gets her revenge in an excellent way, putting a rape victim topless on a movie poster just seems a bit tasteless. Anyone else agree? SPOILER OVER.
Alright, marketing department, I get it. You’re trying to be provocative to get publicity. Controversy makes for great publicity. “Sex sells” also. But Larsson’s books sold 21 million copies worldwide, and those didn’t have any pictures of nipple-pierced breasts. Or any breasts for that matter. Maybe just good stories sell, too.
