American version
I’ve never read the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo books, but I have seen both the Swedish and American film adaptations. Both are pretty good. And while each has some differences, they are very, very similar. Okay, that makes sense–they are adapted from the same material.
Swedish version. Like the American version, but with a few more subtitles.
But I mean, even when you are working off the same source materials, there are certain details you think would be different. Like how the two leads have sex. Not that they have sex (that’s obviously in the book), but how. As in the very specific positions and facial expressions and gyrations that are used during sex. I guess the books must be pretty graphic in this regard, because the sex in each movie is exactly the same, from the speed of intercourse to the positions used to the way the woman orgasms.
It just seems odd. You have two filmmakers, working independently, given a scene of two people having sex and they decide they are going to recreate that for the screen in exactly the same way.
And then what else is odd is that I hear people talking about how the books (predictably) don’t follow the plot of the book. But they follow the plot of each other.
Which really leads to my main question: was the American version an adoptation of the book, or the Swedish version of the film?
I understand that screenwriter Steve Zallian and director David Fincher (claim they) never saw the Swedish version prior to making their version, but obviously people around them did. I can just imagine all these people offering Fincher suggestions on how to shoot certain scenes that are essentially copied from the Swedish film and Fincher, having never seen the Swedish version thinking, ”Yeah, great idea. Let’s have her get on top of him and gyrate violently for thirty seconds, cum, then role off him. Genius take on the material.” And then of course, the inevitable moment when Zallian or Fincher watch the Swedish version and realize they basically just did a shot-for-shot remake of a movie that was made two years ago.
