Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Release December 26th London
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is sure to be a huge International success. The book itself has sold over 65 million copies and the Swedish version of the film (dubbed in English and released in 2009) – has been a major critical success already.
Now we’re invited to see Hollywoods take on it starring Daniel Craig as the publisher Mikael Blomkvist and Rooney Mara, who plays Lisbeth Salander, a surveillance agent.
The story is gripping from the start – set against a bleak Swedish winter and remote destinations where anything could happen. You can easily imagine a world of serial killers and rapists as depicted in the novels.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (original title in Swedish: Män som hatar kvinnor – “Men Who Hate Women”) was written by Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson. It is the first book in the trilogy known as the “Millennium series”.
When he died in 2004, Larsson left three unpublished novels that make up the trilogy.
They became posthumous best-sellers worldwide.
At the age of 15, Larsson said that he witnessed the gang rape of a young girl. He never forgave himself for failing to help her.
Like the heroine in the books, the girls name was Lisbeth. Clearly, it was a memory he carried throughout his life.
The Plot – beginnings
In December 2002. Mikael Blomkvist, publisher of the Swedish political magazine Millennium, loses a libel case involving allegations about billionaire industrialist Hans-Erik Wennerström.
He is sentenced to three months in prison, and ordered to pay hefty damages and costs. Soon afterwards, he is invited to meet Henrik Vanger, the retired CEO of the Vanger Corporation, unaware that he had commissioned an investigation into Blomkvist’s personal and professional history. This investigation was carried out by Lisbeth Salander, a surveillance agent with Milton Security.
Blomkvist is promised considerable financial reward in exchange for writing the Vanger family history. Vanger believes that his great-niece, Harriet, was murdered by a member of the family 36 years earlier.
Blomkvist moves to the Vanger estate and begins his research into the history of the Vanger family and Harriet’s disappearance.
Meanwhile, Lisbeth Salander, who was ruled legally incompetent as a child, is under the care of Holger Palmgren, her legal guardian. When he has a stroke, her new guardian, Nils Bjurman takes her case. He is a sadist. He uses his position to sexually abuse her in return for access to her own money. After he rapes her, Salander takes her revenge, torturing him and threatening to ruin him unless he gives her full control of her life.
Blomkvist discovers Salander has hacked into his computer, and persuades her to assist him with researching Harriet’s disappearance. They begin to suspect that they are on the trail of a serial killer…and so on.
If this film is only a fraction as good as the Swedish version then it’s well worth the watch….
