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Jeff wrote:Surprised Fincher recorded commentary for this edition.

I'm guessing he recorded it right before release or after post-production wrapped. I don't even think The Social Network was in theaters when he recorded his track for that. Really wishful thinking, but it would be cool if somehow Criterion nabbed the rights to the special editions for each movies of the trilogy, if David helms them of course.

Most cast and/or crew commentaries are recorded prior to release these days.

And iirc Fincher never likes to revisit his movies in any way once they've been released. Maybe they've queued up a bunch of commentaries, a la Fight Club and Se7en, so they figured they could throw this edition a bone.

If I can make another comment about the music, after hearing both versions, I have to say I prefer this version of "Is Your Love Strong Enough?" to the original from Legend. Much like this version of the story was to the Swedish film, it's more to the point and less flowery.

flyonthewall2983 wrote:If I can make another comment about the music, after hearing both versions, I have to say I prefer this version of "Is Your Love Strong Enough?" to the original from Legend. Much like this version of the story was to the Swedish film, it's more to the point and less flowery.

For me, the cover was the one misstep from Mr. Reznor on the soundtrack. "The Immigrant Song" cover opens the film wonderfully, but the automaton nature of the "Is You Love Strong Enough?" cover over the end credits didn't impress me. Then again, I have a real aversion to heavily applied auto-tune so the lead vocals can't compete with Bryan Ferry's seductive crooning.

EDIT: Okay, I took four minutes to go and listen to the How To Destroy Angels' cover of the song and want to say that Mariqueen Maandig's lead vocal is not slathered with auto-tune like I thought it was when I listened during the end credits of the film. Only Reznor's call-and-response vocal sounds heavily processed. I'm still not much of a fan of the stripped-down approach (the dreaminess of Ferry's original is a big part of the song's appeal), but both the decision to cover such an unusual track and Maandig's lead are quite commendable.

I'm actually less crazy about the "Immigrant Song" cover now, good as it is for the movie (and especially in the first trailer that came out) as a stand-alone track it doesn't stand up to the original. So just chalk the praise/criticism to being more of a fan of Led Zeppelin than Bryan Ferry.

kinjitsu wrote:Jeff Cronenweth on the Fincher Factor

You'd think the NYT could afford a windscreen, this ain't Film Socialisme

Oedipax wrote:this ain't Film Socialisme

My favorite porn parody.

Cold Bishop wrote:

Oedipax wrote:this ain't Film Socialisme

My favorite porn parody.

Post of the year so far

I apparently don't watch enough pornography to get the joke.

For the record, I've never actually seen a movie in the "This Ain't..." uh... series.

Don't want to know how they'll tackle the llama scene

I had to post this somewhere...this is an actual letter to the editor that made it to the print version of the Kansas City Star on Tuesday 1/24/12:

We do not go to the movies very often, but I do look for information in the Preview section’s “movies opening this week.” for something that we might be interested in seeing.

When I saw the ratings for the movie “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” I was shocked.

The rating is “R for brutal, violent content, including rape and torture, strong sexuality, graphic nudity and language.”

Who in their right mind would go to see such a movie?

Robert J. Vohs

Prairie Village

To be honest, I wondered the same thing after I read the BBFC report on Human Centipede II.

HistoryProf wrote:I had to post this somewhere...this is an actual letter to the editor that made it to the print version of the Kansas City Star on Tuesday 1/24/12:

We do not go to the movies very often, but I do look for information in the Preview section’s “movies opening this week.” for something that we might be interested in seeing.

When I saw the ratings for the movie “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” I was shocked.

The rating is “R for brutal, violent content, including rape and torture, strong sexuality, graphic nudity and language.”

Who in their right mind would go to see such a movie?

Before Drive, my reaction would probably be a good rolling of the eyes. After Drive there is a little bit of that (and also considering the conservative Midwestern mindset I know too well that often glorifies violence, but when confronted with the blunt truth of some aspects of violence that this film portrays, says it's immoral, etc, etc.), but I'm more inclined to think there is a good question in there somewhere, beyond the initial reaction.

Seeing that film really opened my eyes to why we find objectionable acts perfectly okay ensconced in a 2-hour work of fiction. And it made me question myself a little, about why I find it okay to bear witness to brutal acts, buried underneath the promise of great performances and searing tension (which it delivered ten-fold for me).

I think what I would tell Bob is that we all secretly like to watch a train wreck infinitely more than a show on the history of trains. It's an elementary point of view that has certainly not been espoused before. We're all voyeurs into a life we're just merely interested in, but maybe don't want to partake in. I didn't want to become a bank robber after I saw Heat for the first time, but getting a fraction of the rush of pulling off the score helped it become one of my favorite movies. And it's very possible to a smaller fraction of people, David's darker films have a similar effect but to my knowledge they've never been directly blamed for someone's murder. So by that logic, Fincher-0/Dexter-1.

Which brings me to this. You can find a neutered-down version of the unsavory elements of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo on network television every night, most notably CBS (who, from what I've read recently, is developing a show in their prime-time mold centered around a loner female computer hacker). Maybe there are mystified, slightly angry letters to the editor in Kansas about the salacious nature of these shows, but it seems to me that when intelligent R-rated movies cover this ground, there's a more twitchy reaction.

Cold Bishop wrote:First impressions: About as good as the film could get, but there's no getting around the fact that it's a potboiler, plain and simple.

Same here. Fincher and his (great) cast treat the material with far more dignity than it deserves, but all that craft can't paper over the fact that it's little more than a string of meretricious cliches, some of which are borderline-offensive howlers, like the bit where the author's surrogate gets to 'turn' a really hot lesbian. Spare me. And the 'detection' seemed just about as retarded as that in any genre film, with pre-packaged clues sprung like jacks-in-the-box on a plot-demanded basis. (Oh no! My daughter has become a Christian! But yay, she's a Christian who happened to decode those veiled Biblical references pinned to my wall on her one and only visit to my cabin!) That's really par for the course for this sort of film, but it's disappointing given that, in Zodiac, Fincher made one of the rare films that actually takes detection seriously.

So I enjoyed the film, but frankly I'd rather see Fincher devote the next few years of his career to anything other than the two sequels. I suspect this film is as good as this material gets, and I know he's capable of much better.

What made you think she wasn't into girls in the first place?

While I agree with you on pretty much every point, zedz, in the film Salander's sexuality is never particularly pegged as exclusively lesbian.
It's perfectly possible she's just a flat-out bisexual who's grown close to him because of his relative decency, a trait she hasn't had a lot of contact with.
I think it's be more reasonable to say that the fantasy of the author is bedding someone experienced with lesbian escapades, not turning her straight a la James Bond in Goldfinger.

For whatever reason while watching the original film I always took Salander to be bi-sexual, not particularly a lesbian. I think the biggest reason for this is because Blomkvist doesn't actually make any advances on her at all yet she decides she's going to have her way with him because, well, why not.

I may have taken that notion into the new film already thinking of the character as bi-sexual and maybe in the new film she is presented as a lesbian, but doesn't the scenario play out the same way? I can't entirely recall but doesn't she just decide to have her way with him without him doing anything to initiate it?

You are correct. I believe it is just after Blomkvist's been shot at. She then draws down the shades...

cdnchris wrote: I can't entirely recall but doesn't she just decide to have her way with him without him doing anything to initiate it?

Yes. She's entirely assertive in the encounter, much in the same way that she seemed in control with the girl that she picked up at the club, or when she was having girl-on-top shut-the-hell-up-until-I-orgasm sex with Blomkvist later in the film. Ben Affleck smiling and turning a lesbian straight this was not. The sexual issues raised by the character seemed to have far more to do with power dynamics and danger/security issues than they did with sexual orientation.

Tom Hagen wrote:The sexual issues raised by the character seemed to have far more to do with power dynamics and danger/security issues than they did with sexual orientation.

Agree entirely, would add it's also her furious groping toward what turns out be (thwarted) intimacy later. Everything for her begins in rage.

zedz wrote:...like the bit where the author's surrogate gets to 'turn' a really hot lesbian. Spare me.

What is it about this particular thing popping up every now and then in modern litterature? Philip Roth's surrogate similarly "turns a really hot lesbian" (150 years younger than him) in The Humbling (plus his alter ego in Elegy is similarly desireable to younger women. Penelope Cruz in this case (!)) and I'm pretty sure the woman Coetzee's other self seduces in the otherwise fantastic Disgrace is also a lesbian, tho not very attractive, as Coetzee makes sure to point out every single time he describes his sexual encounters. I'm sure it also happens in countless Paolo Coehlo books, but I'm not adventurous enough to seek them out. Are these old geezers officially out of ideas? Sorry for going off topic, but I had to get this out. It has really been bugging me lately...