Monday, March 26, 2012

Review: The Girl With A Dragon Tattoo (Hollywood vs Swedish)






Let me start this by saying that I am a little disappointed in the movies (just a little, really), because they never got one to perfectly match the real Lisbeth - she is supposed to be a 23-year old punk, brilliant hacker who looks like 12 years old, height is 4'9" and she's got almost no boobs - that's why she got a boob job on the sequel. Not that it mattered, but that was supposed to add a chill to the character, right? - a little tough lady.

As I understood, since the Swedish film came out first, David Fincher tried to hard to make the plot as close to the novel as he can yet as different from the first movie adaptation as possible.There are major details of course that they cannot alter, so the difference are mainly on the minor ones. But since the Sweidsh adaptation had been critically-aclaimed, not to mention a box-office hit, for sure it had been a huge challenge in Fincher's filmmaking ability. As what they say, it's like fixing something that is not broken (or is already brilliant) in the first place.

I cannot argue with most Western reviewers, in general, the English adoptation is indeed a better one in a lot ways. Well, since it got a better budget ($100M vs the later's $13M), it looks and sound better (of course Hollywood would never settle for less).The characters too suits better. Yeah, Noomi Rapace is a very good actress, she did the role very well, but there was not too much chemistry in the two main characters in the first film. Mikael looks to old and too lumpy and she was too spiky and harsh - and it's so unlikely and akward when they ended up together in bed. On the other hand, Ronney Mara and Daniel Craig had this chemistry and dynamics since the start - when Mikael broke into her apartment with coffee and bagel. Even without reading the novel, you'll know somehow, they will end up having beautiful rromance despite the age difference. And Erica Berger (Kalle's co-editor of Millenium and long-time lover) is supposed to be a hot lady on her 40's - and they got that on the English version, the first one was too old and not so classy to be projected as a lady who had been married to a rockstar and is having a long time affair with her co-editor, and note - her husband permits the affair and even allows her to spend a night with Mikael, provided that she keep their marriage intact - she should have a hot personality to have such a colorful lovelife, right?

But in fairness to Niels Arden Oplev's Swedish film, it is also better in some ways. Since the novel is on Swedish setting, the Swedish actors looks more natural in the film, the places looks more appropriate - that is if you had read it of course. An quoting from Oplev, "It’s like, what do you want to see, the French version of “La Femme Nikita” or the American one? "

If you had read the novel though, you'll surely notice that there were little, yet good-to-have details that the adaptations hadn't included or altered. Which, I believe, is inneviatble because you cannot really  put all of the details from a novel of hundreds of pages into a two-and-a-half hour film. Here are some of them:

In the English version (so with the novel), Kalle's daughter visited her and she was the one who discovered that the names and numbers in the journal are reference to bible verses, in the Swedish film, it was Lisbeth who discovered it and emailed it to Mikael, there was no reference to his daughter in the Swedish film. Palmgren, Lisbeth's first guardian was not mentioned in the Swedish film too, I believe he played a huge part in Lisbeth's character and it is a good thing that the US version includes him. The flashback of the 60's is also a good one. And they also made a big deal out of the part where Lisbeth had dressed up, went to the Carribean and withdrawn funds from Wennerstrom's bank accounts in the Cayman Islands - i love that part, she's so gorgeous!

On the Swedish version on the other hand, they had their share of good stuff. There were more details in Lisbeth's life showed on the Swedish adaptation. It shows how she had killed her dad, something that's not told on the novel until the sequel (The Girl Who Played With Fire) although the prequel had already somehow gave us an idea of what happened back then that bought her to be under guardianship. It also tells about her relationship to her mom, something not mentioned on the English version. The Swedish fillmaker also chose to include the fact that Mikael will be in prison for 3mos on top of the fine.

And my favorite in the Swedish version - the whole travel to Australia thing. Although they altered how they found out that Harriet is in Australia, it's still a good thing that they had included that Harriet migrated to Australia, using Anita's name, got married to a sheep farm owner, now managing the farm with her sons - she's also sun-tanned so it looks really believable. In the English film, they left out that part and decided to find Harriet in London where Anita used to be living before she died. But Anita isn't supposed to be dead right? She should be in London and wiretapping her line will lead them to Australia, were Harriet is living under Anita's name. But that was fine.

For me, both films are great in their own ways. And I really cannot say one is better than the other. Both movies are great because they came from one single plot - one great novel. And this is just the start. I havn't watched the sequel yet, it's because I am not yet done readin "The Girl Who Played With Fire". For some reasons, I love reading it first before watching it.

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

There's A Fine, Fine Line Between Love and a Waste of Time




"There's a fine, fine line between a fairy tale and a lie,
There's a fine, fine line between 'you're wonderful' and 'good bye'
I guess if someone doesn't love you back, it isn't such a crime,
But there's a fine, fine line between Love and a waste of time."
-Avenue Q

You may be a teen, who is just starting to make sense of this crazy little thing called love, thinking that LOVE is always cool and always great, with your Knight in Shining Armor riding in a white horse, you have your own version of a Cinderella story and all other Hollywood movie cliche, but you're too afraid to try it out.

You could also be a thirty year-old single lady who had already been through half-a-dozen break-ups and is feeling hopeless that you will ever have your own "happy-ever-after" relationship.

Or you could be a pretty young lady who just had a recent heart break and is not facing the mirror asking stupid questions like, "Am I not pretty enough?", "Is she better than me?", "What have I done wrong?" or worse, "Do I not deserve to be happy?" (well, the last question is foolish, of course everybody do! No matter how ugly you are - no erase than, they say all of God's creation are lovely - but yes, no matter who (or what?) you are, you deserve to be happy!)

Or lastly, you can be someone who thought you've already moved on from your previous relationship and you've already learned that most men are jerks and they deserve some sort of "revenge", your thinking of be-friending his/her current love interest and is planning to sabotage his/her life (if that's the case, then you haven't moved on yet!)

You may be one of the persons mentioned (or none of the above), but since you are reading this, you probably are interested in the four letter world spelled L-O-V-E. Now, the question is, is love really a waste of time? No it's not! As what the song or that picture above says (please forgive my spastic fingers for such an ugly hand-writing - I'm just trying to make this thing as personalized as possible), there is a fine line between the two. Meaning just one wrong move, and you will get thrown unto the other side of the line - and you're "soon-to-be-happy-ever-after" will be a complete waste of time. But more often that not, it is actually worth the try. But never believe in that old-school cliche saying " There's no harm in trying" - of course there is! If you try to learn ballet, you may break your legs. If you try to learn swimming, you might drown and die. If you try falling in-love, you MIGHT get a broken heart that often cause irreparable damage (no erase that,  it is always repairable, it just takes a while). But never be afraid to get a broken heart! As you grow older, you will still get your heart broken one way or another, whether or not you are in a relationship. After all, it is when you fail that you will learn more.

Love, like life is a trial-and-error. You will fail here, but it doesn't mean you'll let yourself be stacked. You have to move forward, meet someone new and try it all over again. Is there a guarantee that it will last? There's none. You just have to keep wishing that it will work the next time around. Somewhere, somehow, you will meet someone who will be worth it. You will cry a bit, or sometimes a lot, bit at the end of the road, you're not going to count how many barrels of tears you've cried for that person, what will matter the most, are the happy days you had, and knowing that despite all the trials, the two of you still made it through. If in the end, you both, or one of you will realize that it's not meant to be, you will go separate ways, your heart will break again. But if it had been a happy and lovely journey, then it's worth it. If may a waste of your time, but it could be worth the waste.

As what this bitter-sweet song says, "You'll never know till you reach the top if it was worth the uphill climb". There may be a lot of painful risks in trying, but it was the people who tried that reached the finish line with victory.

*Listen to the song here: There's A Fine Fine Line by Avenue Q

Review: Nights in Rodanthe (novel) by Nicholas Sparks









"A tender story of hope and joy; of sacrifice and forgiveness -- a moving reminder that love is possible at any age, at any time, and often comes when we least expect it. At forty-five, Adrienne Willis must rethink her entire life when her husband abandons her for a younger woman. Reeling with heartache and in search of a respite, she flees to the small coastal town of Rodanthe, North Carolina to tend to a friend's inn for the weekend. But when a major storm starts moving in, it appears that Adrienne's perfect getaway will be ruined -- until a guest named Paul Flanner arrives. At fifty-four, Paul has just sold his medical practice and come to Rodanthe to escape his own shattered past. Now, with the storm closing in, two wounded people will turn to each other for comfort -- and in one weekend set in motion feelings that will resonate throughout the rest of their lives."

Review:
Just like the non-disputed The Notebook, the story of Paul and Adrienne tells that love is not time-bound, nor is it a matter of age, nor of distance. As always, Nick Sparks never failed to make me cry. The story is remarkable but not as much as the characters themselves - Paul, 50 years old, a very successful surgeon who had ended up loosing the heart of his wife and son along the way, now trying to make everything right in his life ; and Adrienne, 45, a woman who had devoted all those years being a responsible mother of three after a painful divorce, forgetting herself in the process. After reading it, I came up with a realization that the movie is not only about an intimate love story shared by two individuals in the most unexpected circumstances, more than a few days of intimacy during a storm. It also tells us about a  mother's love for her daughter (Amanda), who lost her husband at a young age, to whom Adrienne had ended up  telling their secret love story to, 14 years after it happened, for her to know that she understands how it felt to lose someone she loves dearly, for she too had lost her heart when Paul, a few months before they can finally be together had died in an accident after saving his son from a landslide while volunteering in Ecuador.

Sparks, a fan of a tragic ending, which somehow depicts reality that love is not always a happy-ever-after did a good job in this story. I tried to compare this to other novels of him, but I cannot. Because every story has it's own impact, they are awesome in their own ways. And despite the same element in the stories: divorce, southern living, death, cancer and long distance love affair, he had made every story distinct from the other. Needless to say, Nights in Rodanthe is superb!

Trivia: The names of the lead characters where Nick's Christmas present to his in-laws - Paul and Adrienne.