[Review] The Girl Who Played With Fire
Nov. 2nd, 2010 12:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lightcastleThe quick review: Not as intense as the first film, Noomi Rapace is still amazing.
The film keeps its two leads apart for almost the entire film, as both investigate sex trafficking from different angles and for different reasons. The issue of how men treat women is still present, but less central to the plot in some ways. There are - perhaps happily - fewer scenes that are so deeply uncomfortable watch.
Noomi Rapace remains absolutely fascinating as Lisbeth Salander, genius hacker, social outcast, and force of vengeance. Her difficulty relating to people, matched with a fierce desire to somehow right wrongs comes through in almost every word, look, and movement. She's the kind of person who disappears for a year, then calls up an old lover and asks if she wants to get laid without explanation, and yet that lover has been holding onto a birthday gift for months in the hopes of seeing her again. I can relate.
These movies are slow compared to a modern Hollywood pace, but don't drag. The end is somewhat ambiguous and that feels anticlimactic to some degree. (I am told that the book ends on an actual cliffhanger, which makes the ending a bit more understandable)
If you could handle the first and enjoyed it, you should like the second.
The film keeps its two leads apart for almost the entire film, as both investigate sex trafficking from different angles and for different reasons. The issue of how men treat women is still present, but less central to the plot in some ways. There are - perhaps happily - fewer scenes that are so deeply uncomfortable watch.
Noomi Rapace remains absolutely fascinating as Lisbeth Salander, genius hacker, social outcast, and force of vengeance. Her difficulty relating to people, matched with a fierce desire to somehow right wrongs comes through in almost every word, look, and movement. She's the kind of person who disappears for a year, then calls up an old lover and asks if she wants to get laid without explanation, and yet that lover has been holding onto a birthday gift for months in the hopes of seeing her again. I can relate.
These movies are slow compared to a modern Hollywood pace, but don't drag. The end is somewhat ambiguous and that feels anticlimactic to some degree. (I am told that the book ends on an actual cliffhanger, which makes the ending a bit more understandable)
If you could handle the first and enjoyed it, you should like the second.
