The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest

In this the third instalment of Larsson’s trilogy The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest (2009) Noomi Rapace proves why she is such an inspired piece of casting as Lisbeth Salander, even when she spends so much of this film in a hospital bed recovering from surgery to remove a bullet from her brain, she manages to mesmerize ever time she appears on screen. Who will ever forget her appearance as she walks into court, worth the price of your cinema ticket alone? Daniel Alfredson manages very successfully to précis the detailed plot and sub-plots contained in the third book and bringing the story to a very satisfying conclusion.

It’s safe to say that the majority of Monday nights RBC Film Club viewers were in agreement that this movie was if not the best of the three adaptations was very close to it. A very Swedish evening’s entertainment, which was spent on the edge of your cinema seat with a solid build up of tension helped by the music and the way the film, was lit.

I have included, for your information Monday night’s introduction as follows:

Tonight’s movie The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is the third and final film adaptation of the best-selling trilogy written by the late Swedish author, Stieg Larsson As your aware if you were at my introduction to the previous film adaptation The Girl Who Played With Fire, novelist Stieg Larsson died suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 50 in November 2004 soon after delivering the manuscripts for three crime novels that make up the trilogy. Stieg was the editor-in-chief of the Swedish anti-racist magazine Expo from 1999 (Swedish version of Searchlight) having previously spent 20 years working at a mayor Swedish news agency. During the last 15 years of his life, he and his life companion Eva Gabrielsson lived under the constant threat of right-wing violence.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)

The first film in the trilogy was an effective thriller describing the relationship between a middle-aged left wing journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) and a young bi-sexual ward of the state, researcher and computer hacker Lisbeth Salander They joined forces to investigate the disappearance, some 40 years previous, of the great niece of Hendric Vanger, the 82 year-old former Chief Executive Officer of a group of companies owned by a very wealthy dynasty.


The Girl Who Played with Fire (2009)

The second instalment of Larsson Trilogy is about a female researcher and a journalist who are about to expose the truth about sex trafficking in Sweden, they are brutally murdered and Lisbeth Salander is accused of the killings. Her history of unpredictability, vengeful behavior and her prints on the murder weapon make her the ideal suspect! Blomkvist does not believe her capable of these crimes and does every thing in his power to prove her innocence. During his investigations he unearths some facts about Salander’s murky past life, which involved her father Zalachenco. Lisbeth tracks her father down with the sole intention of killing him but not before she is shot and buried by her father and stepbrother. Lisbeth digs herself out and buries an axe into Zalachenco.


The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest. (2009)

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest brings back Noomi Rapace in the starring role of the pierced and tattooed computer hacker Lisbeth Salander and Michael Nyqvist as the crusading journalist Mikael Blomkvist.

Two seriously injured people arrive at the emergency ward of the hospital in Gothenburg. One is the wanted murderer Lisbeth Salander who has taken a bullet to the head and needs immediate surgery; the other is Alexander Zalachenko, an older man who Lisbeth has attacked with an axe.

Summary

The strength of these excellent film’s is (1) their tremendous story line with the last book being the best and most informative, (2) the appeal of the main protagonist the anti-authoritarian punk Lisbeth Salander, so well drawn by Stieg Larsson and who has become one of my favourite fictional characters.

Collectively the three film adaptations have generated over $200 million in box office receipts worldwide. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has the highest box office for a subtitled film released in the US since Pan's Labyrinth.