The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is an ultra-successful Swedish import that blends thriller elements with drama to create a quite satisfying film. It is the first of an already filmed trilogy, and an adaptation of the equally successful books by the late Stieg Larsson. The films is about a girl with a dragon tattoo, but it is also equally about a journalist named Mikael. As the film opens, he is being sentenced for libeling a tycoon and will be imprisoned in six months. He is also being shadowed and researched by the mysterious titular character who is a very adroit computer hacker, as well as a troubled young woman. She has been hired to track Mikael for another rich man who wishes to employ him to solve a murder nearly forty years old. Before they know it, both Mikael and Lisbeth, the girl are working on the same case. This is a fascinating film in which you don't even notice its 150 minute length until the very end when the filmmakers decide to squeeze in multiple endings and wrap things up perhaps a little to nicely.
***1/2 stars
