Subtitle: Lisbeth Salander Can Kick your Ass in Two Languages and Two Media
Book read. Swedish film watched. Trailer for Fincher version due out this Christmas now watched three times.
I cannot think of a better example than The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo to display what I talk about when I talk about film adaptation. Films adapt movies in one of three ways. Off the bat, the third way is the Perfect Way, which is to be perfect. Closest I've seen to this so far is Joe Wright's Pride and Prejudice, or Sofia Coppola's The Virgin Suicides. It both lifts dialogue from the book and gives it perfect artistic expression to capture the dozen or so nuances the author weaves into 100 + pages that most film just forgets.
The first way is the Reactionary Way. This is what directors and screenplay adapters do in order to not upset the (usually rabid) fan base of the book. They take the plot line literally and plunk it into film, slap some blocking and production values on that baby and let 'er ride. Usually tons of detail is lost and the audience leaves shaking their heads in self righteous disappointment saying “the book was so much better.”
Most recent example of this was Water for Elephants which I downloaded as I read it. Easy, absorbing read without much deeper meaning about humanity than aging sucks and love rocks. No matter. The backdrop is scrupulously detailed with obscure facts about depression era traveling circuses, elephant health care, and gorgeous circus act play by plays. The film almost captures this stuff, washing up in the trough as the sumptuous doppleganger of Freaks the actual film made by and for depression era traveling circuses.
The movie nails the red velvet production values, and crams every last plot twist in the book into an hour and a half. It even has a perfect cast. I literally cannot think of better people to play these roles. Yet, it fails. It is ok. It does not grip or prod or beg to be followed at all like the book does. I self righteously shake my head. It is a reactionary film to the given novel.
The second way of adapting films from text is the Gut Reaction Way. Exhibits include the 1940s version of Wuthering Heights and the grossly underrated Secretary where it goes very well, and Starship Troopers where it goes very, very badly. These take brilliant characters, in and re-imagine them in filmic structures. These directors know what they want to see, and, well, to hell with the reading public's opinion of the original text.
In Secretary, the general plot line is preserved, but most of Lee's motivation is skewed. The relationship is explored far more deeply in the film than ever was in Lorrie Moore's short story, and is eventually seen as functional and unique instead of stunted and anonymous. The result is a touching true love story showing development of characters once lost as sadist and masochist in a blissfully sado-masochistic compromise. Oh, and it looks like the budget was big as Water for Elephants' was, but in fact is more along the lines of The Blair Witch Project.
I don't even want to talk about Starship Troopers, and no amount of arguing about the difficulty to achieve good and serious sci-fi. It was ugly and destroyed poignant relationships and challenging concepts of warfare. Plus, Denise Richards just causes movies to ash.
Which is to say, overall that writers of fiction and writer/directors of film have two obligations for mainstream consumption (p.s. Fuck avant garde fiction and film. What a waste of time): Plot and Emotionalism.
If an adaptation nails just one of these, it fails in delivering it's reason for being. No, Francis Lawrence, $38 million spent on lighting and set design and exotic animals will not evoke a fever of pure love, hate and fear like thinking before directing Cristoph Waltz as a paranoid schizophrenic circus ring leader. IE. Learn to let some scenes take longer than two minutes, and let your oscar winning German off his three lines per scene leash while devoting (I swear) 50% of your screen time to close ups of your Edward Cullen prize.
I am angry at that film for being such a disappointment.
Which is exactly what I do not expect to happen December 23rd with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The book is an action-packed thrill of bad people doing bad things and getting their sweet sweet comeuppance. The Swedish film was great for several reasons.
it was Swedish.
It was Swedish.
The girl was perfectly cast.
It followed the book quite well.
It lacked for several reasons.
That poor Swedish actor just does not have the sex appeal Larsson describes for Blomkvist
pacing. The book, granted spends a lot of time following Blomkvist around as he reads things and stares for hours at photographs while drinking coffee, but the spirit of the book—no matter how many pages are spent describing this or that detail in a forty year old photo, is snappier than snap bracelets and thrice as deadly.
I have no qualms about Hollywood doing its own version. They even look to have obeyed the idea of a leading lady who does not look like Megan Fox, who I was worried they really would cast. Rooney Mara is neither pretty nor made up. What I liked about Noomi Rapace, who played Lisbeth in the Swedish version, is how technically she is not gorgeous, but she exudes the confidence from a hard core that characterizes Lisbeth and is magnetic. She never actually looks angry or riled up, exactly as Lisbeth is described. Mara, on the other hand projects a tight-coiled anger and glares at the camera in the poster...
Because the plot of this first installment of the Millenium trilogy focuses more on Blomkvist's actions than Lisbeths, it is nice to see a disproportionately large number of shots of Daniel Craig to those of Mara in the trailer. Even so, Mara may, and this may be one of the few times I ever say this, emote too much. I worry about central casting, then, even if it's marginal and overall an impressive choice.
So, not only was it inevitable with a sale that high, but Hollywood also has the chops to demand someone like Daniel Craig play Blomkvist, and has the good damn sense to force the pacing to reflect the reading experience.
If the trailer is anything to go off, it will not disappoint. It's unusual to say the least. It is also an extreme and innovative way of putting together a trailer. The trailer for the Swedish Gil was synonymous with any action movie-some quick shots and some plot told, there's even a cheesy voice-over making sure you know what's going on. The advantage of selling 30 million copies of a book in 41 languages and more digital copies than all of Nora Roberts' books combined, is that a film maker can safely assume their audience knows the plot, and thus dispense with the pleasantries when galvanizing your audience into spending $9 on a theatre ticket when that nine bucks could be spent buying a stocking stuffer. (NB. Does the juxtaposition of abusing women and Christmas disturb anyone else?) That is, in a minute and a half long trailer, you see, there are in excess of 180 shots. That is how many distinct cuts there are in 30 minutes of film, usually. These film makers are not fucking around with their fucked up material.
The trailer tag line is: The feel bad movie of Christmas. Catchy.
It makes me wonder on tangents about where and when our society got so gritty in it's entertainment. Cartoonishly so, almost, except it takes itself very seriously. The result is not the feel good revenge of Kill Bill, but the intense disgust and sadness of Schindler's List combined with the crunchy blood lust of clean Jason Borne movies. It's a sexy-as-hell, hero worshiping version of Monster or North Country.
That is what the book felt like, it's what the trailer looks ready to deliver, without dropping a single crucial detail: flowers to motor bike to blocking and tattoos. I am ready to rank this movie in a Top 5 adaptations, and I've only seen 1.5 minutes of it.
Oh, did I mention the trailer also features the best possible cover of a Zeppelin classic? Yea. It does. Who is that band, and what torrent do I have to get on?
