The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (2010)
Starring Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace, Tehilla Blad, Lena Endre, Annika Hallin, Sofia Ledarp, Jacob Ericksson, Georgi Staykov, Aksel Morisse, Niklas Hjulström, Micke Spreitz, Anders Ahlbom, Hans Alfredson, Lennart Hjulström, Per Oscarsson, Michalis Koutsogiannakis, Mirja Turestedt, Johan Kylén
Directed by Daniel Alfredson
Expectations: Moderate. I enjoyed the last one pretty well.
Oh man, where’s my notebook? I seriously need a road map to navigate the ridiculously complex plots of these movies, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is probably the hardest to follow of the trilogy. It is also the most boring of the three as well. Y’know I was diametrically opposed to the US remakes of these movies, just on the simple fact that these films were just coming out and didn’t need a remake. After viewing them all, I can’t really argue with the desire to remake them. If they were tightened up and the dialogue was easier to digest, I think I could love these stories.
Noomi Rapace is once again fantastic as Lisbeth Salander. She spends a good portion of this film in the hospital recovering from the shitstorm that capped off the previous film, so she doesn’t have nearly enough time to kick ass. There’s also a lot of courtroom scenes that didn’t do anything for me either. I was hoping for a more thrilling film, like The Girl Who Played With Fire was, but instead I got an overly talky, exposition-heavy film to end an okay trilogy. Eh.
The first one was bad enough I didn’t care to see the rest. David Fincher, hopefully, will do wonders with the source material.
Good move. I think waiting for the remake is actually the way to go on these. Even without any knowledge of the remake’s quality. Fincher should be able to pull something good together.
This one is better read than watched for sure. I had no interest in this series at all till my wife started leaving her paperbacks lying around the house. I started reading and was hooked on the series. I have mixed feelings about the trilogy. I wasn’t anticipating a remake, but then I saw the red band trailer. things have changed a bit now on that front.