The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – Blu-ray Review

The Film:

Based off the popular soon-to-be trilogy by Swedish author Stieg Larsson, The Girl wit the Dragon Tattoo is one of the more complex thrillers in recent memory. The film has one A-plot, but features a slew of subplots, something that most films would find itself buckling under that weight, but here, director Niels Arden Oplev allows each subplot to conclude while given their due. What that makes is a very long movie, that for some audience members will have their patience tested. If they can make it to the 152 minute mark, others will be rewarded by a fully involved thriller, that never allows the viewer to be a step head of the protagonists, but instead will uncover the mystery along with them.

In case you haven’t picked up the books (don’t worry I haven’t yet either), The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo follows an unsolved 40 year disappearance of a young girl, the uncle who’s willing to find some sort of resolve to it, and a journalist caught on the wrong side of a political scandal he uncovered. To know more, is to ruin the film, but the title does not refer to the disappearance, but instead references a female hacker, who along with her own emotional baggage gets caught up in the mystery of the disappeared girl, as she traces the journalist’s every move. You might want to go back and reread this paragraph, because the film is pretty involved with characters, their relationships to everyone, and how everything ties into the mystery, but it’s never confusing, something we can thank that 152 minute running time for. Minus the art angle, one could think that this is the style and finished product Ron Howard wanted his Robert Langdon films (Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons) to be: a sprawling, interesting, gripping mystery thriller. Sadly, his films failed to impress viewers who didn’t fall in love with the books prior. Oplev has crafted a dark and beautiful looking film, and it’s no wonder why David Fincher wants to remake the film.

If anything, I want to read these books. The key reason for that, is the title character, Lisbeth Salander, the girl with the dragon tattoo on her back. Played like an enigma by Noomi Rapace, she’s a startling anti-hero, a bookworm, computer-tech vixen, someone I want to know more about. Rapace is cold and calculating, yet when we do get to peek behind her walls, we see interesting bits and pieces of her character. Lisbeth is complex, as most of her arc doesn’t have anything to do with the main plot, but yet it does thematically and emotionally. Rapace’s performance is endlessly captivating, the hook to keep you watching for that 152 minutes, and lucky for us, we get three more films with her (The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest, and the American remake). I feel for the actress in the American remake who has to step into Noomi Rapace’s shoes. They’re big ones to fill.

The Blu-ray:

Audio/Video: Music Box releases the film on high def to mixed results. I felt the transfer was decent enough, but hardly as glossy or detailed as I hoped. Colors are okay, black levels are the transfer’s strong points, with little grain, but it’s a soft picture, with marginal differences from the DVD. The audio isn’t overly awesome either. English 5.1 and 2.0 tracks are included, as is a Swedish 2.0 mix, and English SDH subtitles.

Interviews: Noomi Rapace, who plays Lisabeth is one of the interviews, and offers some interesting bits about her role and her acting choices. The film’s producer Soren Staermose is the other interview, which is again, nice but not as thorough as we should have got.

Vanger Family Tree is an interactive piece, that allows you to play around with the clues and who’s who in this mystery, a Trailer, Stills Gallery, and a quick Sneak Peak at the sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire.

Conclusion: A long, but solid thriller on an average high def disc.

The Film: Rating:

The Blu-ray: Rating:

Jon Peters

I love film. That is all.

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