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TagsFinal chapter of Steig Larsson's hugely popular series
BY MIRIAM RINN
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
MOVIE REVIEW
Avid fans of Steig Larsson's Millennium trilogy who crave a last opportunity to binge on the hugely popular series, at least until the David Fincher-directed American version of the first book comes out, will gobble up "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest." But this Swedish cinematic adaptation of the final chapter of the trilogy lacks nutritional value. Directed by Daniel Alfredson in the same plodding style he used for the second film in the series, "The Girl Who Played with Fire," this one comes in at a ponderous 148 minutes. Under the assumption that lovers of the mystery series won't stand for anything being left out, Alfredson gamely tries to include all of the book's plot threads. It turns out, however, that office politics at Millennium magazine and Mikael's (Michael Nyqvist) mid-life romance with Erika (Lena Endre) are a lot less compelling than Lisbeth Salander's struggle with Sweden's mental-health system and the shadowy network of geriatric rogue spies out to get her. We have to swallow a lot of bland nougat to get to the nutty goodness.
Not having read the books, I can only judge from the movies that the trilogy revolves around the central mystery of Lisbeth's incarceration in a psychiatric hospital after she attempts to kill her father when she‘s just a girl. That fact was established in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," the first film and, by far, the best. The second and third movies fill in the details of why she tried to kill him, who her father was, and who protected him.
"The Hornet's Nest" opens with Lisbeth, once more played by the intensely enigmatic Noomi Rapace, hanging on to life in the hospital, a bullet embedded deep in her brain. Her father is also in a hospital, recovering from the ax that Lisbeth buried in his head. Alfredson manages to build some real tension until the old man is killed by another man, even older, who then kills himself. Sweden seems to be riddled with homicidal pensioners. Maybe it's the long, dark nights.
Thanks to the country's great socialized healthcare system, Lisbeth slowly (she seems to be in the hospital for months) recovers from her injuries and begins to regain her formidable strength under the eye of a sympathetic doctor. Finally, the doctor has no choice but to allow the police to arrest her for attempted murder. Her defense attorney happens to be Mikael's sister Annika. That's handy because the case turns on his passing her previously concealed evidence about Lisbeth's committment and her troubled relationship with her psychiatrist. At this point, the plot seemed like a retread of events in the previous two films, and I'm guessing, the two earlier books. We already know that she's been horrifically abused by the system, and it's not that hard to guess why.
Although the trial is plopped into the middle of the film like jelly in a doughnut, it's a hoot to see Lisbeth in all her punk/biker/Goth paraphernalia, bristling with spikes and metal doodads. All that studded leather makes the tiny Rapace look like a ferocious elf. Thanks to their inherent drama, these courtroom scenes are less aimless than the surrounding ones, but the movie as a whole feels like a loose connection of scenes meandering to an expected destination. The end feels especially anticlimactic; anyone who has watched more than a few movies knows that a certain character who has been popping up throughout needs to be dealt with, so it's no surprise when he shows up for the big action finale.
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It's hard to argue with success, and the Swedish film trilogy has generated over $200 million in worldwide box office. Considering the length of the movies — all over two hours — and the subtitles, that's amazing. Rapace's Lisbeth has great charisma, and the combination of frailty and fierceness she embodies is hard to resist. It's like those sugary salty snacks we love — you can't stop at one.
