Gone Girl.

The Terrence Malick 'To The Wonder' type poster.

I’ve always had problems with the American director David Fincher, having never really liking any of his movies other than perhaps Seven (1995) a film which starred Brad Pit and Morgan Freeman who played two detectives tracking down a serial killer who centres his dreadful crimes on the seven deadly sins. I could never get to grips with Fight Club (1999), which again starred Brad Pit but this time alongside Edward Norton, which I believe is now classed as a cult movie, but on release never did good box office and was panned by the critics. My next film from the director was Zodiac (2007) a very long film, with another good cast that included Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo and Robert Downey Jr based on a real life serial killer and a movie I should probably have another look at? Then there was another long-winded affair, 2008 fantasy drama The Curious Case of Benjamin Button that again starred Brad Pit and was about a man who ages in reverse where as his love interest, Cate Blanchett aged in the normal way! Then came two films that I particular disliked. The first was The Social Network (2010) that tells us about the privileges of having rich parents. Even worse was his next movie which in fact was a complete waste of time and money as the original version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011) could not be bettered even with Hollywood showering oodles money on the project, don’t waste your time viewers watch the original.

 

Amazing Amy goes missing!

So the Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre Film Club screening of Fincher’s latest offering was viewed with some trepidation. But you will be pleased to hear that I wasn’t disappointed! Overly long, with the best part of the first hour spent trying to stay awake and retain your patience. With characters that grind on your nerves Gone Girl (2014) certainly was not the best film I’ve seen this year? Still I stuck with it and to be fair it did get a little better as time went on and on and on. 

 

Nasty Nick Dunne pleads for her safe return.

Described by a colleague as “a holiday read” which I took to mean lightweight and easily forgettable the movie is based on a best selling American thriller by the same person that provided the screenplay, Gillian Flynn. This rather unexciting movie has been described as a story about modern marriage (one can only hope that’s not true!) but it’s more to do with murder, betrayal and deception. Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) has been married to the ‘Amazing Amy’  (Rosamund Pike) for five years. On the very day of his fifth wedding anniversary she goes missing and the authorities, along with all the local residents, her family and all there so called friends; think that nasty Nick has done her in.

 

Has Nick really murdered his wife?

With not a spare seat in the house I’m sure that the mostly female audience enjoyed the film, but it was hard to confirm as none of our visitors returned for the discussion. It was Julie McMorran’s turn to be host but an impossible task unless she was prepared to give away the films twists and turns but she did say that it was well received critically and commercially and was thought of as a modern film noir – well it did have an competently acted femme fatal in the form of Rosemund Pike!  Don’t think I’ll be reading the book?

and what was the significance of Amazing Amy's pussy ???

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo 2011

I’m not a great admirer of David Fincher’s recent work. Zodiac (2007) was completely devoid of any real tension, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) was tiresomely long and tedious and although I would agree that it was cleverly written The Social Network (2010) was interesting without being dynamic. There’s always a tendency toward flashy technique in Fincher’s output. His latest attempt at directorial immortality, the reworking of the brilliant Swedish film The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009), is no exception; a glitzy out of place opening credit sequence and flamboyant soundtrack does not make up for the films obvious failings. 

This unnecessary reworking of the first part of Steig Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) was the subject of this week’s RBC Film Club evening. Our very own Filmmaker Alec Barclay gave a fine introduction to the evening and took a rather fiery discussion that followed the viewing.  Alec explained that this version of the film, was still set in Sweden but with it’s large Hollywood style budget could afford some well known actors and actresses although the relatively unknown Rooney Mara takes over the role of Lisbeth Salander previously played by Noomi Rapace with Daniel Craig taking time off from his day job as the British spy James Bond to play Larsson’s alter ego, the investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist. Alec went on to talk about the soundtrack, which resurrects Led Zeppelins Immigrant Song this time sung by Karen O from the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s and was created by the same team who won an Academy Award for the music for The Social Network, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails and Atticus Ross son of Radio Caroline founder Ian Ross.

The original Lisbeth Salander.

Fincher's Lisbeth Salander

This is the first part of Larsson’s Trilogy, for which to date 65 million books have been sold, it depicts the relationship between the middle-aged left wing investigative journalist and the young bi-sexual ward of the state, researcher and computer hacker Lisbeth Salander. The pair join forces to investigate the disappearance, some 40 years previous, of the great niece of Hendric Vanger, (Christopher Plummer) the 82 year-old former Chief Executive Officer of a group of companies owned by a very wealthy Swedish dynasty.

Hendric Vanger and Mikael Blomkist.

I personally have two main problems with Fincher’s USA remake. Lisbeth Salander is an iconic character, one I will always associate with Noomi Repace’s inspired performance. There’s an authenticity in the way she, and Michael Nyqvist who plays Blomkvist in the original film, portrays the main characters. In my opinion Fincher goes to far in softening Lisbeth’s image, which does not convey her deep hatred for men. In the original she only had sex with Blomkvist to satisfy her carnal desires whereas in the remake she seems to fall in love with the journalist also at the climax of the film she asked Blomkvist permission to kill the ‘villain’ the real anti authoritarian punk would not seek permission! My second gripe is that the strength of original film, directed by Neils Arden Oplev, is in the way it transposed Larsson’s written word onto the screen. In this inferior interpretation Steven Zaillian takes unnecessary liberties with the novels narrative including changing the ending along with the important fact that Blomkvist’s mysterious list of telephone numbers was solved by someone other than Lisbeth and while we are on the subject what happened to Blomkvist’s prison sentence?

Finally I will ask again the question’s that was raised many times during Monday nights discussion: why did the Americans remake a brilliant Swedish thriller, other than the fact that they can’t read and secondly why on earth did half the cast speak with dodgy Swedish accents (the exception being Sellan Skarsgard who is Swedish) and the other half did not? Perhaps Mr Fincher would have been better to have set the story in America, he made so many unnecessary changes one more would have not made a lot of difference.

The Social Network

Film poster

I was obviously in the minority at RBC Film Club on Monday night, there was me thinking that David Fincher's latest film was about the social network service and website Facebook and the obnoxious wee Harvard students that conspired for world domination of cyberspace but I was wrong! It was a court room drama? The lightweight plot of The Social Network (2010) pivots between the rapid expansion, during 2003 – 2004, of the addictive, at times dangerous, internet phenomenon and the subsequent court squabble between the person credited with programming it, Mark Zuckerberg, and his former friends and business partners, litigation reaching a monitory conclusion but very little else.

The film, based on a book by Ben Mezrich The Accidental Billionaires, is interesting without being dynamic and far from being a candidate for the film of the year as suggested by some of Monday night’s audience. Although it has a cleverly written script by Aaron Sorkin, its rapid fire dialogue could be hard to understand at times. For example the opening scene between the soon to be Americanised Lisbeth Salander, Rooney Mara, and Jesse Eisenberg (Roger Dodger 2002, The Squid and the Whale 2005, Adventureland 2009) who plays the second year undergraduate. Zuckerberg and his cohorts are some of the most unlikable characters committed to film, the man himself is a surprisingly unsympathetic social introvert driven by the need to date girls more easily. I would disagree with the opinion offered that the film offers a snap shot of today’s youth culture, it may offer a snap shot of the more privileged section but certainly not of youth in general.