Saturday, September 19, 2009

Flickan som lekte med elden

Tyttö joka leikki tulella / The Girl Who Played With Fire. SE (c) 2009 Yellow Bird Films and three other companies. P: Søren Stærmose. D: Daniel Alfredson. SC: Jonas Frykberg - based on the novel by Stieg Larsson (published posthumously in 2006). DP: Peter Mokrosinski. CAST: Noomi Rapace (Lisbeth Salander), Michael Nyqvist (Mikael Blomkvist), Lena Endre (Erika Berger), Georgi Staykov (Alexander Zalachenko), Sofia Ledarp (Malin Erikson), Peter Andersson (Bjurman), Micke Spreitz (Ronald Niedermann), Per Oscarsson (Holger Palmgren), Paolo Roberto (Paolo Roberto), Annika Hallin (Annika Giannini), Johan Kylén (inspector Bublanski), Hans Alfredson. 132 min. Released in Finland by Nordisk with Finnish subtitles by Arja Sundelin. Viewed at Tennispalatsi 1, 19 Sep 2009 (premiere weekend). - Digital look especially in forest scenes. - The second Millennium film continues one year after. Lisbeth Salander is a millionaire thanks to her hacker skills. Her sadistic guardian, the attorney Bjurman has ordered a hit on her. The back story is revealed: Lisbeth's father is a defected ex-GRU agent Alexander Zalachenko who is sheltered by the Swedish security police Säpo. Zalachenko is also the father of Ronald Niedermann, who resembles a figure like Oddjob or Jaws in the James Bond stories: a giant boxer who feels no pain. Meanwhile, Mikael Blomkvist is planning to publish an exposé of sex traffic by an investigative journalist Dag Svensson and his researcher wife Mia Johansson, both of whom are found murdered. They had planned to go public with names of customers among the police and the security police, for instance. (Prostitution is a crime in Sweden, and customers get convicted.) - Bublanski is a Jewish inspector, there is a scene in the synagogue of Stockholm, but this has no further relevance to the story. - See my comments on Män som hatar kvinnor. The plot is thick with conspiracy (sex traffic, drugs, corruption, hackers). The web of conspiracy reaches deep into the security police of Sweden (!). This is a story that could have been filmed by Tarantino (the woman's revenge, the tattoo revenge). - Dependable entertainment with an over-the-top plot, outstanding main characters (Lisbeth Salander, Mikael Blomkvist) and great performances by the actors.

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