Devoured (2012)

"An intense, troubling film, boasting a spectacular lead performance from Marta Milans, DEVOURED calls to mind such bleak and visceral late '70s NY urban dramas as TAXI DRIVER and DRILLER KILLER in its expert depiction of alienation and escalating horror."

The synopsis from Amazon.co.uk describes "Devoured" so perfectly that there's very little I need to add. That product description absolutely nails it, uses the word "visceral" correctly, and reminds me of the days when I used to write such concise one or two sentence reviews instead of rambling on to fill up a blog post. For someone who doesn't often suffer from nostalgia, I miss those days a lot.

But as I wouldn't be me if I didn't have my own two cents to add, I will just say that I haven't enjoyed any "low-budget" movie as much I did this one. According to the IMDb, the estimated budget was only $1,500,000. That's still a huge amount of money for normal people, but hardly anything in movie industry terms, so maybe that's one of the few points in any independent movie's favour which I'm willing to concede. You don't need hundreds of millions of dollars to make a good movie if you know what you're doing, but the caveat is that you really do need to know what you're doing.

Although this is Greg Olliver's first horror movie, he's been around for a while making award-winning rock documentaries. His IMDb profile page details how he learnt his craft the right way by going to film school and then working his way up in the industry, so he isn't one of the half-arsed hobby horror filmmakers. The result of his knowledge and experience is that he has created an impressively adult "descent into madness" drama here which, despite its obviously Poe-like elements, isn't predictable at all.

Maybe I would have noticed some flaws if I hadn't been so captivated by Marta Milans as the lead, but the attention to detail is such that I doubt there are any important ones anyway. I would like to say that Marta Milans is to "Devoured" what Gretchen Lodge is to "Lovely Molly" (2011), since they both give outstanding performances which carry the rest of their respective movies, but that wouldn't be a completely accurate or fair comparison. It also wouldn't be fair on everyone else involved. Movies are a team effort, after all.

Everything about "Devoured" is as close to perfection as the budget allows. The cinematography is excellent, and from the script by Marc Landau to the smallest acting role, this is a classy, thought-provoking, and thoroughly engaging production. There are some movies which can draw you in as if you're living in them, and "Devoured" is certainly one of them. Whether you would actually want to live inside another person's nightmare is, however, another matter.

For an American movie, "Devoured" has a very European atmosphere and grittiness about it which means that it's bound to be a bigger success overseas, even if it's only for a niche audience. Such slow burns with great characterisation are unlikely to be so highly praised by the teenage slasher crowd who just want to see boobs and blood, and that's a real shame, but stranger things have happened. No matter what your age or tastes, if you call yourself a horror fan, you owe it to yourself to see this movie.

As far as I know, "Devoured" is currently only available from Amazon.co.uk as a DVD or Blu-ray. Hopefully, a US version will start appearing in stores soon. Keep an eye on the official website for further details.

Dark Tourist (2012)

"A psychological-thriller in the haunting tradition of films like Taxi Driver and Monster, The Grief Tourist takes us into the chilling labyrinth of a man's dark hobby and his even darker mind."

Not a review today but a recommendation. Apparently it's "Labor Day" or something in America, so I'm going to celebrate it by doing as little as possible. Writing a blog post is obviously such hard work!

Anyway, it may interest you to know that Suri Krishnamma's "Dark Tourist", formerly known as "The Grief Tourist" (presumably to differentiate it from Dom Joly's book about the weird hobby rather than the same subject matter), has a limited theatrical release at City Cinemas Village East Cinema, New York. Check it out if you live within range. [It's also available via VOD and iTunes for anybody else.]

As a film noir-ish hybrid of "Chained" (2012) and "Taxi Driver" (1976), "Dark Tourist" might not appeal to everyone unless they are into serial killers or stories about maniacs becoming that way, but if you're reading this blog, it's highly likely that you are the target audience. Even though I'm more into fantasy than real life murders, I think that "Dark Tourist" is a very good movie indeed. It's well written, nicely shot, and has an off-beat, gritty, character-driven feel to it like "Edmond" (2005).

Aside from Michael Cudlitz's outstanding performance which I'm sure is being raved about from one side of the internet to the other, it's also extremely nice to see Melanie Griffith in something on the big screen again. She's still much the same as before except older, wiser, and a better actress than I remember her to be. The scenes involving Jim (Michael Cuditz) and Betsy (Melanie Griffith) are great.

My only minor criticism is that "Dark Tourist" should've been longer. For that reason, the story seems to have some unnecessary additional information near the end which doesn't quite fit in. I won't spoil it for you, but suffice it to say that Suzanne Quast as Iris the prostitute is definitely all woman!

"Dark Tourist" is the kind of bleak and brutal stuff which I'm always willing to recommend. It's not going to make me take up grief tourism—"the act of travelling with the intent to visit places of tragedy or disaster"—as a hobby though. I'm already morbid enough as it is.

Have a great holiday, everybody!

Do Not Disturb (2013)

"After his fiancee is brutally murdered, Don Malek sets out for revenge."

I've seen some strokes pulled in my time, but this one really takes the biscuit. Although I've never had the misfortune to watch the slightly longer "New Terminal Hotel" (2010), "Do Not Disturb" is simply a recut and renamed version of the same thing! What the bloody Hell?

Was this done just so that director B.C. Furtney could get two IMDb credits for the same crappy, low-budget borefest, or was it supposed to fool people into thinking that a straight-to-video movie made in 2008 is a new one?

Apparently, the recutting and repackaging is all due to a change of distributors, so I suppose we'll just have to accept that as the definitive answer on the subject. To be brutally honest, I don't actually care that much. It's not as if I'm going to write a huge shill-review enticing you to watch either version anyway. You can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, and "Do Not Disturb" would still be an overly talky turd by any name.

So, let's see why anyone would be silly enough to watch this movie.

Well, the late Corey Haim has an extended cameo role as a washed-up English rockstar with a constantly slipping accent—the point being that his character is not really English or a rockstar but just an alcoholic bum. Are his less than three minutes on screen worth your consideration? I think not. I'm sure he was only on set because he was allegedly engaged to Tiffany Shepis at the time, and someone thought it would be a good idea to give him something to do while he waited around for her. The biggest clue is that you could cut his parts out of the movie and it wouldn't make any difference to the story whatsoever.

Secondly, there's the aforementioned Tiffany Shepis who fanboys go crazy for but I've never found attractive. It's only fair because she definitely wouldn't find me attractive either. I must admit that she does a better job than usual and seems to be able to act a little bit. How much of her potty-mouthed character is acting and how much is just her, I wouldn't even try to guess at. Yeah, she's kind of pretty, I suppose, and she briefly shows her bra, but it's down to Danielle Fortwangler as a hooker to provide the topless eyecandy.

"Oh, you're so cool, Brewster!"

The lead role goes to Stephen "Evil Ed" Geoffreys who I haven't seen in anything since "Sick Girl" (which was, of course, only filmed the year before). He seems in pretty good shape for an older guy and spends a lot of the movie with his shirt off. If that floats your boat, have at it. His acting here is also better than in anything he has ever done before despite the fact that he's horribly miscast as either a writer or a multiple murderer. A little bit of Evil Ed shines through occasionally, but you can also almost see echoes of William H. Macy's performance in "Edmond" (2005) at times. That would be great if "Edmond" didn't already exist... but it does.

Thus, it's all down to Ezra Buzzington to steal the show as Malek's crippled and equally shirtless neighbour Spitz, an even more boozy and bad-tempered version of Lieutenant Dan from "Forrest Gump" (1994). Easily one of the most prolific and successful character actors around, he doesn't disgrace himself here either. Given what and who he had to work with, the only reason that I could possibly recommend "Do Not Disturb" is for Ezra Buzzington, but that's not enough. For a "Murder Monday", I need lots of blood and guts to set me up for the week ahead.

There's some decent splatter in places, but not that much gore to see as most of the torture and kills occur off camera until near the end. When Malek's revenge surgery starts, the lack of torture porn is overwhelmingly disappointing, but as this is primarily a stagey "crime drama" with horror elements, it's only to be expected that a lot of punches are pulled. While "Do Not Disturb" may have aspirations to be more than something thrown together by the local amateur dramatics group, the lack of budget doesn't help matters.

The camerawork is okay, but the sound is so echoey in places that "Do Not Disturb" feels "studenty" throughout. With unlikeable characters, too much talk, and not enough action, "Do Not Disturb" is tolerable enough to rate as a 2 or 3 out of 10, but it's also hella boring. I didn't make it through in one sitting, and I doubt that you will either.

Make no mistake about it, "Do Not Disturb" should have been renamed as "Do Not Watch".

Do not confuse it with the other 2 dozen identically named movies!

Maniac (2012)

"The owner of a mannequin shop develops a dangerous obsession with a young artist."

I don't know why so many people revere William Lustig's "Maniac" (1980). For me, it's a below average slasher with one memorable Tom Savini effect and little else. Thus, I watched this remake with absolutely no feelings of nostalgia or any idea what it would be about. The truth is, I barely remember the original and have no desire to watch it ever again anyway. The time when a movie like that could be considered shocking is long since past for everybody.

Giving a remake a fair chance is, obviously, a lot easier in a case like this. There's no way that the original could ever be considered a classic of the horror genre, and there's no army of loyal fans who are going to be polarised. "Maniac" (1980) is still a rather obscure, cult movie especially if you aren't an American of a certain age, and so it wouldn't matter if this version was a scene by scene remake as far as I'm concerned. It isn't, but I'm sure you get my point.

Unfortunately, once you remove all the gimmicky killer's POV shots, and get over the fact that Frodo is now a serial murderer who collects scalps, there's very little to commend Franck Khalfoun's version of "Maniac" for. It's a little bit gory, but the kills are too samey and repetitive, there's no tension, and it's not scary. Despite featuring the Q. Lazzarus song "Good-bye Horses" which everyone knows from "The Silence of the Lambs", that's as far as the homage to any better horror movie goes. Everything else is just an updated rip-off of "Psycho" (1960) and its lesser sequels.

Wish you hadn't thrown the ring away now, dontcha?

It's not that Elijah Wood makes a bad serial killer. He did well enough in "Sin City" (2005) albeit as a comicbook villain, but a couple of gormless-looking reflections in the mirror don't provide much room for any depth of characterisation here. Given what he had to work with in this "Psycho"-clone, he's okay but a long way from the subtleties of Norman Bates.

America Olivo as Frank's mother provides some very nice eyecandy yet she's only in the movie long enough to provide us with the unrealistic motivation for Frank's psychosis. If every kid whose mother was some kind of prostitute whom he accidentally saw having sex, there'd be a lot more maniacs running around for sure. Mind you, they'd certainly have to look like America Olivo too for that to happen.

Instead, it's all down to French actress Nora Arnezeder, who plays Anna, to carry the majority of the story insomuch as there's anyone to care about. Even then, her character is flaky and easily dislikeable. Her performance is not outstanding either but simply the best of a bad lot.

Say "Fromage!"

SPOILERS FOLLOW!

The only things that I can really give "Maniac" credit for are the moments which seem intentionally designed to bring out the viewers' prejudices should they have any. The first may only be my own so I'm prepared for the backlash, but I saw Frank's online dating victim as being a huge disappointment to him in the flesh due to her tattoos and piercings. The fact that she's "easy" (plus sexually aggressive) and stupid with it is all part of the stereotype. With typical "horror movie morality", she kind of gets what she deserves.

The interracial couple comprised of blonde Anna and her black boyfriend will definitely annoy racists even though it's also only a trope. The fact that the boyfriend is a total asshole is the real issue rather than the colour of his skin especially as he escapes punishment. Contrarily, the old, drunken socialite and the obligatory gay character are merely cannon fodder despite being slightly more memorable in their roles than anyone else.

As ever, the KNB practical effects are the biggest stars. While mostly effective, they seem to be of the cheaper variety so gorehounds will be divided. I'm really desensitized and didn't think "Maniac" was gory enough, but a more squeamish (and younger) audience might still get a kick out of it.

I'm kind of on the fence about recommending "Maniac" since I don't see it as a horror movie. Psycho serial killers really belong to crime dramas, and "Maniac" is more likely to appeal to the "CSI" crowd rather than the "vampires, zombies, and ghosties" aficionados. Even though the weird ending includes all those supernatural elements for a few seconds, real horror fans (other than die-hard slasher fans) should probably avoid this movie.

M (1931)

"When the police in a German city are unable to catch a child-murderer, other criminals join in the manhunt."

If you want true escapism, there's nothing like an overrated old black and white movie from the 1930s. Thus, I'm finally going to say something about "M" which has now become fixed firmly in my mind as the best cure for insomnia since NyQuil.

I can't even find the words to describe how boring "M" is to watch, or how overacted and frustratingly slow it all is. It's taken me over a week to get through "M" in 15 minute installments because that's as long as I could cope with it until my brain shut down in rebellion and I kept falling asleep.

In the restored version of "M" (as embedded at the top of this post), a third of the movie is completely silent as Fritz Lang intended. There are no voices (or subtitles), no sounds of car engines, or even any ambience during these scenes. Essentially, this is a throwback to the silent era due to sound licensing fees at the time, but without the visuals of "Metropolis" to keep anyone entertained.

Of course, you can always make up your own dialogue during the police searches. I chose to put the words "Where's the sausage?" and "I must find the sausage!" into the mouths of every character. Trust me, it works quite well. It works even better during the "talking" scenes once you turn the shouty German dialogue off completely. And, yes, before you ask, there are indeed lots of sausages in this movie.

I'm sure that "M" was absolutely groundbreaking at the time in its depiction of a serial killer, but it's horribly dated and almost embarrassing to watch now. The cops have nothing to go on except that the killer owns a wooden table, a red pencil, smokes cigarettes, and can whistle one of the tunes from "Peer Gynt". Well, that makes him easy to single out then! And what is the gangsters' master plan to catch him? They use beggars to keep an eye on all the children in the city. Yeah, like that won't cause comedic complications.

Facetiously, I was going to say that the poster is the best part of the film. I'm sure the more pretentious, artsy-fartsy film reviewers have a copy of it proudly displayed on their walls along with "Metropolis", "Nosferatu" and "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari". The trouble is that "M" does have a few good points in spite of itself which makes that argument seem rather puerile.

Peter Lorre is outstanding as the whistling murderer Hans Beckert (Fritz Lang did all the whistling), but he has hardly any screen time for the first hour among all the gangsters and cops who have their own agendas for wanting him gone. There's way too much political nonsense going on in the background which is dull as ditchwater to sit through. There's nothing like lingering over unnecessary details and too much talky exposition to really slow things down to a crawl either.

After just over an hour, things start to come together with the cops realising that their murderer doesn't actually need to own a wooden table but may have written his "Jack the Ripper"-style letters to them on a window sill (thus increasing the number of suspects to the whole world!), and the beggars manage to get a chalk letter "M" slapped on the back of Hans Beckert's coat. Like that won't easily brush off! I don't think I've ever seen a plot so contrived or with characters so inept since the last film I watched.

More by luck than judgement, Hans Beckert gets trapped in a office building by a gang of burglars who, in spite of knowing who he is, don't seem to be all that zealous about catching him (although they eventually do). Colour me confused! The next twenty minutes provide plenty of opportunities for a lot of bulgy-eyed expressions from Peter Lorre as he is forced into hiding in the attic, but not much else. Could Peter Lorre be underused even more? I'd be surprised if his total screen time adds up to ten minutes including the very end.

For those in the know, it's only the final kangaroo court scene which gives "M" its dubious claim to fame. It's all pseudo-philosophy with questions asked about what gives criminals any right to judge a worse criminal. Biblically speaking, it's precisely the hypocrisy that Jesus preached about with Hans Beckert being a not entirely convincing substitute. If you want to start a debate about whether or not insane killers should be protected by the law or executed for their crimes, just show the film from the 1 hour and 34 minutes mark. In the light of recent happenings in America, the final words of the film may hit home to parents. I'm shallow, self-centred and I only have cats so it's lost on me.

"M" isn't really a horror movie so it may not be something you want to watch anyway. There aren't any child murders shown, no scares, no gory bits, or even any suspense. It's more of a crime drama with moderately interesting pre-Nazi Germany imagery. If you like looking at shop windows or watching lots of older German men in suits smoke cigars and drink beer from glasses as big as their heads, this is the movie for you. No wonder Hitler banned it! You can say what you like about all the bad things Hitler did, but hiding this drivel from the world wasn't one of them.

With a running time of an hour and 48 minutes, "M" truly suffers from being all talk and no action. You can easily skip 75% of the scenes for a better paced and less convoluted story. I'm surprised that there isn't a MST3K version in existence which would definitely improve things.

It's just another Murder Monday! Snowtown and Killer Joe

As promised, I've now started doing my reviews according to a daily theme. I've added some new tabs to the navigation bar above so you can follow my progress and find the posts easier should you have any desire to ever revisit them.

Today, of course, is Monday so it's the beginning of my "Murder Monday" series. I was going to call it "Macabre Monday" until it dawned on me that there were really only two or three truly "macabre" movies in existence. Pardon the pun, but I didn't want this series of posts to be that short-lived.

Anyway, the two titles which I've chosen to review today are "Snowtown" and "Killer Joe". They may not appear to have much in common apart from being made in 2011, but bear with me because they do.


Snowtown (2011)



"Snowtown" is an Australian movie based on the true story of "The Snowtown Murders" which happened between 1992-1999. You can tell it's the '90s because they have a Sega Megadrive in it.

Although a great deal of artistic licence is used to make some characters more sympathetic than others, make no mistake about it, these are all bad people. There's not one character in the whole thing who is likeable although Daniel Henshall, who plays John Bunting, is certainly outstanding in the role of a very charismatic psychopath. Lucas Pittaway, on the other hand, who plays Jamie Vlassakis, doesn't really do a lot apart from stare and act like he has Asperger's syndrome. I still have no idea if it's intentional.

As you know, I'm a horror guy not a true crime aficionado. I find most films which deal with real serial killers to be very boring indeed, but "Snowtown" hooked me because I didn't know anything about it. In fact, if it hadn't been for a "horror reviewer" (and I use that term loosely) on YouTube who was overpraising the disturbing aspects of the movie, I probably wouldn't have watched it at all.

Suffice it to say that there are a couple of ridiculously nasty moments of torture and murder which might be quite harrowing for most people to watch. For me, I'm tempted to say, "Meh, I've seen worse." It's not that I didn't enjoy "Snowtown", but the good stuff such as garrotting and toenails being ripped out is sparse amidst all the somewhat confusing drama.

Even for anyone familiar with the story beforehand, the conflation of certain events makes it hard to tell what's going on and in what order. I watched "Snowtown" cold, read up on it, and then watched it again to see if it made any difference. Unfortunately, it made things more confusing as I tried to associate the real victims with their dramatised equivalents.

"Snowtown" is clearly a low-budget, gritty piece of filmmaking, but it could be taken as a really black comedy if you didn't know any better. I had the same problem with "Chopper" (2000) so it must be an Australian thing which I'm just not getting. In both "Chopper" and "Snowtown", the awkward and uncomfortable way that characters speak to each other is all rather deadpan and far more amusing to my British ears than it's probably meant to be.

The ending sort of fizzles out which, depending on your taste, may not be very satisfying. If there is ever an American movie of the same subject matter, it will probably concentrate on a trial and throw all the gruesome story elements in as flashbacks so it's all down to how much you prefer more linear Aussie storytelling without any dramatic onscreen resolution. Personally, I would have liked to have seen how the killers were caught.


Killer Joe (2011)



Moving right along to "Killer Joe", this is another very linear story which uses its "in medias res" elements so sparingly that the exposition is organic rather than forced. In an age where characterisation has become contrived padding for set pieces of action, I appreciate such old school subtleties.

Unlike "Snowtown", "Killer Joe" is a pretty straightforward piece of fiction based on a stage play of the same name. It's still about murder, a very charismatic and undoubtedly psychotic killer, and has another bad ending so it makes the perfect double feature for anyone who wants to be left hanging twice in a row.

All staginess aside, William Friedkin really knows his stuff with these white trash dramas. I enjoyed "Bug" (2006) although I know most horror fans didn't, and so I'm obviously the right kind of audience for this. "Killer Joe" had twice the budget of "Bug" yet still feels like a low-budget but classy production in the same vein. Not to be too much of a fanboy here, but William Friedkin, as a director, certainly knows how to bring out the best of the entire cast.

Matthew McConaughey, channelling Paul Newman, gives the best performance of his entire career as the titular "Killer Joe" Cooper. He's definitely come a long way since "Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation" (1994) although I did think he was pretty good in "Reign of Fire" (2002). What can I say? I like dragons and Christian Bale too.

I'm not going to name everyone, but for a movie where every character is intentionally horrible in their own way, Emile Hirsch from "The Darkest Hour" (2011) is surprisingly sympathetic, and Gina Gershon, give or take a Kentucky Fried Chicken drumstick, is still as hot as when she was in "Bound" (1996).

Basically, the story is all about hiring a hitman to do away with Emile Hirsch's character's mother for financial gain. There's an insurance policy which will give everyone a nice little payout, settle some gambling debts, and, obviously, it becomes the source of even more trouble as the plot progresses.

While there isn't much gore, there's certainly some quite bloody and violent moments which are very well done. I could almost feel the final one with a can of pumpkin pie filling, but I'll say no more than that.

"Killer Joe" is definitely a black comedy with offbeat acting, some absolutely bizarre scenes, and, in a similar way to "Snowtown", a lot of extremely awkward dialogue which wouldn't be out of place in either film. Juno Temple plays Dottie Smith in such an autistic manner that she could almost be the sister of Lucas Pittaway.

The ending is rather abrupt, but you have to blame the writer for that rather than William Friedkin. On the plus side, you can make up your own mind about how things would play out which I know some people like to do.

Not to spoil it for you, but I think that one more gunshot during the fade-to-black before the final credits would have worked well. That would still leave things open to interpretation, but I don't make films, I just watch them. Less is more, as they say, even though I prefer it when a movie has a more substantial conclusion.


So that's my first "Murder Monday" over. Let me know if you like the new format or if I should go back to the old way of doing things with individual reviews.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)

(AKA Män som hatar kvinnor - "Men Who Hate Women")



"A journalist is aided in his search for a woman who has been missing - or dead - for forty years by a young female hacker."

Since I'm in a defending Swedish movies mood, I decided to watch all three of the "Millennium Trilogy" DVDs, based on the novels by Stieg Larsson, back to back. Sadly, just like "Let the Right One In", there are remakes on the horizon which nobody sane should ever want to watch so I advise you to pick these titles up now before all the confusion and online fighting sets in.

I know I'm a bit late reviewing "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo", but to be perfectly honest (as I always am), from the description on the IMDb, it didn't sound like something I would be interested in. The funny thing was that every time I went to post an Amazon link to this blog, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" kept popping up first in the affiliate link iframe so eventually it wore me down enough to give it a try. I added it to my Netflix queue, fell asleep watching it online, and then decided to get the DVD because it was actually very good. I just couldn't be bothered with all that "buffering" nonsense from the Netflix stream and wanted to watch this on the big telly anyway.

I also acquired the two "made for TV" sequels starring the same actors but with a change of director and screenwriter. The less said about them the better really as, although they were entertaining enough in their own way, they lacked the freshness and brutality of the first film.

So who is the "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"? Her name is Lisbeth Salander and she is played by a very skinny/athletic looking actress called Noomi Rapace. Never heard of her? No, nor me either. Her character is a hacker who has recently been released from a mental asylum for reasons which will become more obvious and important as the story progresses and she has a massive dragon tattoo on her back for no reason which is ever explained. It's interesting to note that the dragon tattoo is only a little one on her shoulder on the book covers but a massive big beast all over her back for the film even though it has no significance whatsoever to the story. I have a feeling that it was going to be explained sooner or later but the author died before completing the ten volumes he was planning to write so the trilogy leaves a lot of things unanswered.

Anyway, the film begins with a middle-aged reporter named Blomkvist getting convicted of libel and facing a jail sentence for a piece he wrote about a crooked businessman. None of that is overly important as it just provides a convenient way for him to leave the Millennium magazine which he writes for to do some freelance private detective work for an old rich guy whose daughter went missing forty years ago. This is the main story but because of how badass Lisbeth Salander is introduced it becomes far less interesting than her life. It's like having two main stories running at the same time which throw up hints and clues to the other story. Yes, it's hard to explain but pretty easy to follow even though the missing girl story becomes little more than a cipher to get Blomkvist and Lisbeth bonded together.

All three films have the same structure so I would hazard a guess, having never read the books, that the main story is only ever used to focus on the two leads. The second film brings up "human trafficking" and then doesn't really go anywhere with it once Lisbeth's story comes to the fore again. I don't see this as a flaw though. It's just a different way of doing things and can really only work when you have interesting characters like her in the first place.

The acting in all three films, though particularly "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo", is really good and has to be since everything in them dispels the myths that Sweden is full of tall, beautiful blondes. The actors are ordinary looking to say the least and wouldn't be out of place in a British soap opera such as "Eastenders". It's all about pimples, skin pores, acne scars and wrinkles rather than the plastic beauty of Hollywood. These people have lived-in faces and it makes the whole thing a lot more realistic even if some of the coincidences in the plot strain credibility to the maximum along the way.

Of course the most memorable moments from "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" either involve sex scenes, brutal violence, or a mixture of the two. If you've seen "Eastern Promises" then think along those lines. When something happens, it's so not what you are expecting considering the almost "CSI" nature of the rest of it. One thing is for certain, you won't see this uncut on American television any time soon. To say any more would give too much away but suffice it to say that what happens in the first film continues into the second and third parts as well.

The missing girl story of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" actually becomes a quite convoluted tale about a serial killer with a bit of a twist at the end. I've been trying to think if I'd ever seen anything like it before and I have to admit that it seems to be original. I'm sure it has been done before somewhere especially as all these films have an element of Greek mythology about them which is even mentioned, but I can't remember where. Again, to start trying to make parallels to similar plots in other films would ruin it for you so I won't.

Things you will notice because they are glaringly obvious is the amount of product placement for lots of Apple, Sony and Nokia electronic equipment along the way. Maybe I'm nit-picking a bit but would a hacker really use an Apple computer rather than a PC? I've always thought of them as being computers for people who can't really use a computer, but I may be wrong. Since I'm one of those people who uses Ubuntu for everything, I'm in no position to criticize their choice of operating systems anyway even if they do seem to be easily hackable.

But I digressed. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is an amazing, classy, iconic and quite powerful film in places let down by a made for TV feel and a few plotholes that were better left unfilled by its definitely made for TV sequels. You don't have to watch the sequels, "The Girl Who Played with Fire" and "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest", if you don't want to because "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" works as a complete standalone movie in itself. I watched all three and was a little bit disappointed, but I got addicted and had to see how the story turned out. After watching the "Bourne" and "Matrix" trilogies, I should have known better really.

I'm going to give "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" an 8 out of 10. I haven't given a numerical score to a film for ages so think of it as a novelty. The only reason it loses marks is because it didn't really go far enough with the serial killing angle and went too far in other ways without a satisfying conclusion. I rate both the sequels as 6 out of 10 because they felt like the first and second parts of a miniseries rather than separate films and were certainly long enough to be so.