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I told producer Soren Staermose that
I would do the film, but only if I had artistic control
over cast, script, length, final cut etc. Having this
control, I saw as the only way for me to do a successful
film based on such a popular book.
I wanted a film with strong emotions,
strong characters and a controversial and intriguing
story. This is my trademark already and this book had it
all. The visual style and production design had to show
a big and special film. And I wanted all the small clues
and details in Larsson’s book to be there - old still
photos, which makes Harriet come alive, old footages
from the bridge accident, Lisbeth having a photographic
memory etc. And I would like the film to keep the edge,
that the book has. That it dares to show the dark side
of society.
I asked two of the best writers in
Scandinavian Rasmus Heisterberg and Nikolaj Arcel, to
write the script for me. Together we dissected the book
and plotted out the storyline. Rasmus and Nikolaj then
wrote like crazy. The time left before the start of
shooting was already short.
It took the caster Tusse Lande and I
months to cast the film - I am hysterical with finding
the right actor for the characters. There must be a
special connection between the actor and the character.
The actors must have the shine of the character. Swedish star actor Michael Nyqvist presents
us with
humanity, empathy and heavyweight intellectualism, which
we expect from his character Michael Blomkvist. And he
does this so well that we are captured in excitement
all the way though the story.
Lisbeth Salander is possibly the
character in modern Scandinavian drama with the most
expectations attached, and I can’t believe the luck we
have had in finding Noomi Rapace for this part. Noomi
has transformed herself into her character to a chilling
perfection. Her performance as Lisbeth is outstanding.
I talked cinema photographer Eric
Kress and production designer Niels Sejer into
travelling to Sweden to do this film under hectic
conditions. A decision I did not regret at any moment.
They have raised the bar for this film, giving the art
department work amazing details and the images a dark
exciting feel.
The prep time was short and early on
it became clear to me that we needed a miracle to bring
the film home on time and budget. At that time the
Swedish crew came on board, a team that was determined
to make a quality film even if it took long days and
hard work under tough conditions. And man, did they
deliver. As did the whole ensemble of actors. The
feeling of the set was that every shooting day was a
battle for quality. A battle we were determined to win.
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"Oplev's direction is crisp and
observant, and while Rapace's performance is the
extraordinary one, Nyqvist's is solid and steady,
and Sven-Bertil Taube, as the moneyed patriarch Henrik
Vanger, is compelling." ...Stephen
Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer
"Fans of this particular novel will
be relieved to know that Niels Arden Oplev has done a
superb job. Those who haven't yet read the book will
find the film a compelling piece of work in its own
right.... Nyqvist faces a difficult task keeping
viewers interested in his part of the story, and that he
does so is a credit to a much more understated but
beautifully judged acting style." ...Jennie
Kermode, Eye for Film (UK)
"'The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo' is
an edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller, and despite
the long runtime, it never drags. The storytelling is
intelligent, and the two leads are endlessly watchable.
The casting is impeccable." ...Liz Braun, Jam!Movies
"Beyond the actual story elements, it
is the searing presence of its two morally opposed
central characters who inexplicably find each other and
uniquely connect that captures our imagination. As It
Is In Heaven's Michael Nyqvist is perfectly
cast as the idealistic investigative journalist with no
secrets, while Noomi Rapace is a sensation as the
computer-hacking girl with the tattoo, body piercing and
dark past." ...Louise Keller, Urban
Cinefil
"The film makes excellent use of the
cold Scandinavian landscape to emphasize the story's
gloomy loneliness. And Rapace and Nyqvist have
compelling chemistry." ...Liz Schwartzbaum, EW
"The movie's most engaging mystery is its own. That
would be the frankly sexual romance between Mikael (Michael
Nyqvist) and Lisbeth (Noomi Rapace). They're remote
characters who don't give a name to their romance for
fear of ruining everything. It's an affair you rarely
see in movies, and both actors do a splendid job
conveying the brief, intense explosion that occurs when
loners collide." ...Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail
"Salander’s battles are the reminder that the original
Swedish title translated as Men Who Hate Women; misogyny
has a pathologically violent edge here, which makes it
all the more tricky that a relationship develops between
Salander and the man she at first spies on, and then
works with, disgraced investigative reporter Mikael
Blomkvist. Thankfully Nyqvist plays the part with
shaggy simplicity, even a certain resignation, and that
neatly offsets Rapace’s trip-wire demeanour." ...Craig
Mathieson, sbs.com.au
"Aiding immeasurably to the film's appeal are the two
central performances. As the world-weary but supremely
dedicated Mikael, Michael Nyqvist does a good job
of creating a character that you actually believe is
smart and resourceful enough to put the disparate pieces
of the complex puzzle together." ...Peter Sobczynski,
eFilmCritic.com
"Oplev keeps everyone, and
everything, on the move, the tension unrelenting as new
suspects keep popping up. He is greatly helped by a
number of finely wrought performances, with Rapace
unforgettable as the dark and troubled Lisbeth.
Meanwhile, Nyqvist brings just the right splash
of irony and intensity to his wronged journalist,
forever unable to resist a great story, and in "The Girl
With the Dragon Tattoo," that's exactly what we've got."
...Betsy Sharkey, The Los Angeles Times
"This action/art-house hybrid
miraculously manages to be faithful to Larsson’s novel
without seeming slavish. It doesn’t hurt that he’s cast
the movie perfectly, too, thanks to the Viggo Mortensen-esque
Michael Nyqvist as obsessive reporter Mikael
Blomkvist and the pierced powerhouse Noomi Rapace as
avenging cyberpunk angel Lisbeth Salander." ...Chris
Nashawaty, EW
"'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo' is
an engrossing, classically suspenseful story... It is
Oplev's quiet handling of multiple plot threads that is
richly deserving of praise." ...Jan Chaney, The
Washington Post
"When the picture gets down to the
business of sleuthing, 'Dragon Tattoo' becomes a
riveting motion picture, burning through blurred
photographs, laptop gymnastics, and old-fashioned
community questioning to help the tale creep along. The
pieces fit nicely, with Oplev preserving the
page-turning elements of the story while keeping matters
deliciously cinematic through evocative widescreen
photography and stellar performances from Nyqvist
and Rapace, who capture the thrill of the hunt and the
formation of mutual respect in very few moves." ...Film
critic Brian Orndorf
"Director Niels Arden Oplev has taken a dense mystery
overstuffed with suspects and miscreants and brought it
to resplendent cinematic life. So much critical
information is conveyed via images that whatever details
and subplots the novel loses on the way to the screen
are made up by the film's atmosphere of simmering,
brooding evil." ...Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald
"Nyqvist and Rapace are
terrific as Blomkvist and Salander; their onscreen
chemistry is spiky, intriguing and genuinely touching,
whilst their unconventional relationship is every bit as
fascinating as the central mystery. The film is also
beautifully shot, with cinematographer Eric Kress making
the most of the remote island landscapes." ...Matthew
Turner, Time Out
"There's also little doubt that like its literary
inspiration, the movie is generally far more enthralling
when focused on Salander's exploits. Nyqvist is
certainly just as good as Blomkvist, yet he and the
movie's various periphery performers are simply unable
to hold the viewer's interest to the same extent as
Rapace." ...David Nusair, Reel Film Reviews
"Director Niels Arden Oplev and
screenwriters Nikolaj Arcel and Rasmus Heisterberg have
done a remarkable job streamlining Larsson's dense
narrative without losing any crucial details or its
dark, almost claustrophobic tone... Salander is a
complex antihero, the kind of role American movies
rarely provide for women and one of the most compelling
characters to hit movie screens in recent years. She
comes to the aid of Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist,
excellent in an Everyman role)." ...Greg
Maki, Star-Democrat
"It's dark and dismal and beautiful and human and
everything a crime film should be." ...Joshua
Starnes, ComingSoon.net
"Where Nyqvist's Mikael is a strong character,
insightful and constantly scrutinizing his surroundings,
when Lisbeth enters the picture, he is obviously
outmatched. The pair is certainly no Nick and Nora
Charles, but they develop an odd kinship, and the
chemistry the two actors bring to the matchup is
riveting to watch." ...Ian Buckwalter, DCist
"Oplev deserves credit for crafting a well-paced crime
thriller that stays mostly faithful to the source
material, but it's the relationship between the two
protagonists (and to a lesser extent, the chemistry
between Nyqvist and Rapace) that is the real
driving force of the film." ...Jason Zingale,
Bullz-Eye.com
"What sets it apart thematically is the late Stieg
Larsson's preoccupations with racism, misogyny, and
financial scandal as corrosive elements in the Swedish
character. What sets it apart emotionally is the moving
and sometimes funny rapport between the rumpled reporter
(Michael Nykvist's warm, steady performance will
probably be overlooked but shouldn't be) and the pierced
angel/demon who can do anything with a MacBook." ...Dan
Lybarger, eFilmCritic.com
"The pairing of Rapace and Nyqvist
works very well; they have great chemistry and spark off
each other nicely, with Rapace creating the sense of
Lisbeth’s ambivalence beautifully." ...Coco
Forsythe, Future Movies (UK)
"It’s a tribute to Oplev’s skill that the film never
drags. Not since the American version of The Ring
have blue-tinged northern landscapes, isolated islands
and black-and-white photos been invested with so much
foreboding." ...Margot Harrison, Seven Days
"When we are first introduced to Lisbeth she is working
as a researcher who is hired to keep an eye on Mikael
Blomvist - Michael Nyqvist, who also gives a
stellar performance." ...Adam Tobias, Watertown Daily
Times
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