It takes a certain amount of science, a whole lot of violence, a kick ass female protagonist, guns (of course) and show stopping action to produce a crime thriller that both draws the viewer into the plot and steers through an epic course of unexpected danger. Millions have read Steig Larsson’s Millenium trilogy, and now the first book in the series “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” has been made into feature length movie, underscoring just how popular and influential the books are worldwide. With the other two books already filmed and on their way to theatres in the near future, the popularity of this series indicates the easy translation from words to action, and how much support there is for the trilogy.

The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, released in 2009, is directed by Niels Arden Oplev and is entirely in Swedish. While there are talks of a Hollywood english remake (no surprises there), the Swedish movie has proven to be a hit success, drawing thousands to its release around the world. Several highlights do distinguish the movie from previous crime thrillers, however the overlong sequences, clichés and glossed over details make the entire movie quite tiresome to watch.

In a relatively derivative start to the film, investigative journalist Michael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) is hired to uncover the whereabouts of Henrik Vanger’s (Sven-Bertil Taube) great niece, Harriet (Ewa Fröling).  Through a turn of events, professional hacker, Lisbeth Salander (Noomi Rapace) manages to uncover more evidence through her skills, and forming a rather odd team they both race to discover just what happened to Harriet and who was responsible for her disappearance.

While the pairing of Lisbeth and Michael forms a dynamic but formulaic feature of the classic detective/investigative drama, it is the little details in The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo that really holds this film back. One of the most obvious and outstanding ones is the fact that Lisbeth, and seemingly all the other people in the film use Apple MACs. There’s really nothing wrong with macs at all, but in this film the product placement is so clear and so absurd that it is at times extremely hard to get fully immersed into the story when you can see Lisbeth “hacking” Blomkvist’s own macbook using generic and completely implausible code. In fact, the film makes hacking look so EASY, it seems all you need to know to be a professional hacker is to type in “access Blomkivsts’ laptop” into a generic linux-esque program, and voila! – she is now freely able to surf the contents of said laptop. Well done, Lisbeth.

Not only this, the use of iPhoto to alter the contrast and brightness of the photos key in uncovering the mystery of Harriet’s disappearance really brings this film down into a whole new level of amateurishness. This was certainly not the professional and crafty duo portrayed in Larsson’s novel! Perhaps it is just the aversion to Apple products in general that makes the film so hard to understand how exactly they came about the conclusion of the events. In this way, it is probably just as well the novels work and describe what happens so much better than in the movie!

The ease at which they seem to come together in deciphering the case is a huge let down in terms of audience participation as well. In a rather convoluted mish mash string of events, the pacing of their discoveries alongside the total ease at which they find significant points relating to the case really draws the movie out unnecessarily. Tiring ever so fast, it is any wonder people can even be bothered attempting to figure out what actually happened! Michael Nyqvist is thoroughly disinteresting as Blomkvist, and gives a rather dire and uninspired portrayal contrastive against the wonderfully acted Lisbeth.

Despite the poor pacing and attention to detail, one of the revelations of the movie is without a doubt the lead actress, Noomi Rapace. If attaining all the facial piercings for the role isn’t enough to show how committed she is to the series, her acting as a strong hardcore, angsty woman translates to the screen with a tenacity that seems to attract all attention on her disregarding the woeful script. While the character does call for generic emo/hardcore subgenre-esque clothes, hair and customary black makeup and pants, Rapace seems to have a knack for portraying the strength and determination of Lisbeth, which really works well against the grain of the other typical archetypes in the movie.

In a rape scene that is disturbing as well as added shock value, Rapace pulls off the scene extremely well, particularly exemplifying the emotion and helplessness in her situation. It is in fact, Rapace in particular that saves this movie from total disaster – too bad the script wasn’t any better in portraying the strength of Larsson’s work!

For cinematic lovers of crime drama and thrillers, Girl with a Dragon Tattoo is a must watch – if only because it is based on one of the best crime trilogies in literary fiction, and it does contain a strong female protagonist which is often hard to come by. Despite these features however, the screenplay and lack of chemistry between Blomkvist and Lisbeth really brings the film down, and it is definitely the little details that prevent audiences from fully suspending their disbelief for two hours. For a film in its genre, it is no doubt one that compared to other crime thrillers such as Tell No One, a critically accalaimed French film by Guillaume Canet. Girl with a Dragon Tattoo isn’t a total disaster – just one which could do with several major improvements. With the next two films in the series wrapping up post production, it is any wonder if the interest will be there to continue watching, or to just go back to reading the books!

For fans of comedy, Burn After Reading seems to be a movie that people either really love, or really hate. While this movie certainly does not contain the slapstick or laugh out loud humour you might find in other comedy-billed movies such as The Hangover or Death at a Funeral, the subtle ironic dialogue, wonderfully dark humour and the hilarious jabs at American suburban culture makes Burn After Reading a film which definitely appeals to a more adult audience. Fans of the Coen Brothers will appreciate the clever script and trademark dry humour and witty one-liners though, as much like the brothers’ other comedies including Intolerable Cruelty or O Brother, Where Art Thou?, the humour is very subtle, but also very satirical and uproariously funny. The casting is exceptional in this film, and as far as performances go, Brad Pitt and John Malkovich really make some of the best scenes in the movie. It is not just the ensemble cast that makes this film so enjoyable to watch however, but also the insanely clever script. In fact, each scene is filled with so much sarcastic wit and irony that you may often miss the subtle humour portrayed by the character. The sheer stupidity of each character just keeps amalgamating until the final climax of the movie, and it is without a doubt the end scene that sums up the entire absurdity and hilarity of the film’s in general.

Burn After Reading starts off with an extremely amusing opening scene featuring CIA agent Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich) getting a lecture on his drinking problem and a lower clearance at his office. Disgruntled, he quits and begins writing a memoir on his life as a CIA agent, much to his wife Katie’s (Tilda Swinton) disbelief (and cynicism)! While Osbourne is portrayed as an unsuccessful deadweight, Katie is the unemotional conniving bitch who seems to always get what she wants. In the wake of Ozzy quitting his job, she organizes for a top hard-ass lawyer to handle her pending divorce papers so she can be with her boyfriend Harry (George Clooney), who portrays a womanising dweeb. Although he is having an affair with Katie, he is clearly just in a rut with his wife and kind of wants to make things work – in typical male fashion of course. Unbeknownst to Harry however, his wife Sandy is also cheating on him during her book tours out of town. It is through this web of affairs and relationship problems that the plot really unfolds, when Katie burns all of their financial information onto a CD including Ozzy’s memoir so she can gain as much as she can from her planned divorce. Three bumbling gym trainers, Linda (Frances McDormand), Chad (Brad Pitt) and Ted (Richard Jenkins) happen to find these files however, when a copy of the CD is found in Katie’s lawyers’ secretary’s gym bag in the locker rooms. What ensues is a series of ridiculous and hysterical interweaving of events, which not only leads Linda and Chad in talks with the Russian embassy armed with the CD, but a shockingly extreme climactic ending which sees an intense and ludicrous end to all characters involved in the “clusterfuck”, as J.K. Simmons puts so eloquently.

The actors really make the most of an intensely funny and sarcastic script, which mocks just about everyone from airhead gym trainers to top CIA officers. The efficient cross cutting between the different character developments and their entangled affairs with each other’s problems and issues is part of the main reason why this film is so intruiging, and the eventual climax which sees just about all the characters coming together and relating to each other some way in accordance to Ozzy’s failed memoir makes Burn After Reading truly entertaining to watch.

Brad Pitt surely must be one of the most underrated comedic actors today, as he pulls off a superb comedic performance in this movie as Chad. The stereotypical “all buff, no brain” demeanour is one of the most entertaining traits of his character, and it is undoubtedly his phonecall to Ozzy in the middle of the night, as well as his brief exchange with him in Ozzy’s car that are the most memorable scenes of the movie. His break in into Ozzy’s house and climactic showdown with Harry also marks the most extreme turning point of the movie, and it is truly so shocking and so dark that initially, you don’t even know if you should laugh or not!

John Malkovich is also remarkable as Ozzy, and it is often quite funny/sad to see his dreams being shot down by everyone including his wife. Kevin Sussman makes a short but brief appearance as Harry’s stalker (AKA the man employed by Tuchman Marsh), and does such a fantastic job as the innocent stalker employed by Sandy’s hired divorce company that his scene is also very memorable.

The dialogue in this film is overall so sardonic towards America and its culture in general, that every wry, sarcastic line may be referred to the intense scrutiny of America’s questionable subculture and its inhabitants. The irony contained in the dialogue is part of why Burn After Reading is SO incredibly funny – the fact that each character “seem to all be sleeping with each other” just highlights how absolutely ridiculous the entire movie is. Harry’s discovery of his wife’s affair, as well as Harry’s worry of Ozzy being “trapped” in his marriage/divorce is just one example of the fine humour the Coen Brothers utilize to help mock American suburbia, and the American dream. Linda’s obsession with plastic surgery and the desire to look perfect is also incredibly amusing – she rationalizes that she works in a gym which is all about appearance, so she obviously really needs that tummy tuck and operation to get rid of the vaccine mark on her arm!

Every scene and every character is so well written, Burn After Reading is unquestionably worthy of getting on DVD just because it is so watchable and amusing. It definitely improves with each viewing, and it is interesting to dismantle just how this movie is contructed and how each character relates to each other.

You really got to hand it to the Coen brothers – a combination of A-list actors, smart dialogue and trademark humour makes this another classic to add to their credits. A movie as dark and funny as Burn After Reading is hard to come by, so much so this film really does make you appreciate how a comedy such as this can evoke such thought and opinion. While the plot may confuse some, and puzzle others, lovers of dark comedy will undoubtedly appreciate how this film uses the extremities of violence, job losses, death and marriage breakdowns to emphasize how we are all most probably trapped in the same cycle of deceit, espionage and incredulity in our own lives!