For those who wanted more of the artful meditation on societal misogyny that David Fincher brought to his 2011 film version of Stieg Larssons bestselling Swedish crime drama The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, you have my condolences. The Girl in the Spiders Web, directed with gun-to-the-head urgency by Fede Alvarez (Dont Breathe), settles for being a tension-packed, go-go-go thriller that will pump adrenaline into your nervous system for nearly all of its suspenseful if implausible 117 minutes. Oscar nominee Rooney Mara is out as the Lisbeth Salander; we now get Claire Foy, giving her refined image as Queen Elizabeth II in The Crown and wife to astronaut Neil Armstrong in First Man a kinky, kick-ass makeover as the tattooed, pierced, bisexual hacker and avenger on abusive, predatory men. Timely much?
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Foy is killer good. Reactions may be mixed on the movie, which is based on the 2015 novel by David Lagercrantz (hired after Larssons death to continue the Millennium cash cow series). Alvarez and co-screenwriters Jay Basu and Steven Knight take big liberties with the backstory, which first saw screen life in 2009 as the start of a Swedish trilogy, directed by Niels Arden Oplevs and starring a stellar Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth. Youll be pleased to know that the Uruguay-born Alvarez does not skimp on the juicy pulp. And, yes, the heroine still has her dragon tattoo.
The Girl in the Spiders Web starts with a flashback in which the young Lisbeth escapes from the lair of her pervy father, a Russian crime lord, leaving her sister Camilla to dads deviant ways. Lisbeth really has it in for male creeps. Early on, we see her truss up a dude who has beaten his wife and assaulted two hookers. A Taser comes in handy, as does her skill in transferring the scumbags funds to these female victims.
Its the reappearance of the now-grown Camilla (Blade Runner 2049s Sylvia Hoeks) as a svelte blonde dressed in red and ready to do her own damage that sparks the action. As head of a group of brutal mercenaries called the Spiders, her sister wants to get her hands on software capable of hacking into the worlds nuclear arsenals.Its that same software that Lisbeth is hired to protect by Frans Balder (Stephen Merchant), the inventor of the program. Suspicious of all power-mad governments, Balder holds the passwords in the head of his six-year-old son August (Christopher Convery), an on-the-spectrum kid who brings out Lisbeths protective instincts. No such sentiments bother Camilla, who kidnaps the boy. With Edwin Needham (a scene-stealing Lakeith Stanfield), a NSA security techie also on her tail, Lisbeth is cornered.
Except, of course shes not. Showing athletic grace and a knack for always being a dozen steps ahead of her pursuers, Foy has a ball with the role while also supplying the nuance and grace notes that the too-busy script leaves out. As cinematographer Pedro Luques whooshing camera follows Lisbeth across a Swedish obstacle course of icy roads, motorcycle chases and exploding buildings, the Girl tries to escape the spiders web. Will she? Theres little doubt. The Girl in the Spiders Web knocks itself out by pushing too hard. Its Foy who holds us in thrall by taking us deeper into who Lisbeth is than ever before.
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