The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

           In 2005 first book from the Millenium Trylogy titled: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson was published. Next year the second book: The Girl Who Played with Fire appeared and finally the third part: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest hit the stores in 2007. The books become instant bestsellers and you couldn't walk by a book store and not notice the covers. All of the sudden everyone loved Swedish books.

No wonder that the book almost immediately drew moviemakers' attention.

The Swedish were first and realised all three movies in 2009. Michael Nyqvist portrays Mikael Blomkvist and Noomi Rapace stars as Lisbeth Salander. The film follows the book very closely. We meet Mikael, who after writing a scandalous article has to resignt from his journalist job for a while. At the same time he is being invigilated by Lisabeth on the order of Henrik Vanger, who wants to hire Mikael. Our two heroes eventually meet and cooperate to find Vanger's niece, who disappeared over 40 years earlier. At the same time Lisabeth has to fight her own battle, which will only come to a close at the end of the third movie. I really liked that movie because I was fresh after reading the book and I was curious to see how they would handle some part which I liked most. I instantly liked Lisabeth as a, despite everything, very strong character. For me the face of Lisabeth is the face of Noomi.

Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth Salander in the Swedish film

Such succesful venture couldn't have gone unnoticed by Hollywood, however. In 2011 the American version on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is realised starring Daniel Craig as the journalist Mikael Blomkvist and Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander. The American version of the story doesn't follow the book as much as the Swedish one. It rather focuses on the thrilling tale of the missing girl search bypassing most of Mikael's troubles. However, Lisabeth's story is shown in details. This movie is an excellent action picture, in which Hollywood is so greatly specialised. 

Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander in the American film

Two different movies based on the same book. Two different approaches to the same story and two good results. Two excellent Lisabeths :)