Back Seat Producers

In 1989, Maria Rossi murdered 3 people.  She did this while being the subject of an exorcism and since then, she’s been locked away by the Vatican.  It’s now 2009, and her daughter, Isabella, wants some answers.  Izabella has joined with a documentary filmmaker to travel to Italy and find out if her mother was truly possessed.

That’s the basic premise to The Devil Inside the newest horror film to follow the general style of “found footage” movies like Paranormal Activity and The Blair Witch Project. The difference with The Devil Inside is that this presents  itself as a straight-up documentary from the start, complete with prologues using news footage, expert commentary and police video.  It’s a good idea to try something like this, but unfortunately the filmmakers never quite follow through with this as a straight-up documentary.

Basically, the start-up is sound, but then the follow-through goes back to the familiar with just found footage. Now I tend to like these sort of movies, but The Devil Inside makes a few key mistakes that shatters it’s illusion.  The most apparent of these is obvious “acting” by some of the principle players.  One scene in particular stands out for this and that’s a bit of business when Isabella, who’s now been joined by a couple of priests who are experts in exorcism, takes part in an their examination of her mother.  Up until this point, Isabella, has been cautious about getting involved with any of the proceedings.  But when her mother, in the midst of displaying multiple personalities in scattershot ways, starts to beckon her with a childhood memory, Isabella gives in too easily.  It’s just too obvious to the point of looking like it’s forced by the filmmakers as opposed to being something that naturally happens.

It doesn’t stop there.  It’s obviously apparent to the audience that Maria Rossi is the victim of demonic possession and later revealed that she’s possessed by multiple demons all ready to spread further.  This does indeed happen with one of the priests, who after his encounter with Maria, isn’t quite himself.  This priest, David, has to break from the documentary and go perform a baptism where he’s followed by the director of the film.  At this baptism, David performs a pretty heinous act, which one would figure would have him being stopped and subdued by the crowd immediately, but that isn’t what happens.  Instead the film breaks and David is able to make his escape back to the rest of the principle players.  It’s a contrivance that just doesn’t ring true with the set-up.

What would’ve been more inventive is if this movie had followed the initial idea of totally being created as a documentary, say somewhat along the lines that a movie like The Fourth Kind did.  It certainly would’ve been more difficult to do that and get the kind of scares that the filmmakers wanted to get, but it could be done (the earliest of these found footage movies, The Last Broadcast actually does this quite well).

Now, The Devil Inside certainly has it’s good moments as well, the scenes with Maria acting out are really nicely done (with the one exception) and real standout moments for actress Susan Crowley.  The main cast, for the most part, are characters that you want to follow, in particular the two priests Ben and David, played by Simon Quarterman and Evan Helmuth respectively, and that’s even taking into account the forced bit that the director, William Brent Bell, puts David through.  Fernanda Andrade plays Isabella, and again, except for the forced stuff she has to do, she does just fine (though she sort of comes off to me as Mila Kunis-lite).

Though I have these problems with The Devil Inside, I’m also willing to chalk up some of this to the environment that I saw this in.  This was a packed house with a lot of people there who’s main concern was entertaining themselves more than watching the movie.  If I see this again through home video, then I might come away from it a little bit differently down the road.  For now though, there are certainly better examples of this kind of film that I can more easily recommend.  If you must see The Devil Inside I’d suggest waiting another week or so for a less interactive audience.

Swedish investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist has made some serious allegations against a powerful business magnate that has backfired on him.  Blomkvist’s reputation is shattered and the magazine that he writes for (and co-owns) is facing a tremendous legal battle. Simultaneously, Blomkvist is being investigated by another business tycoon as part of a background check with the main investigator being a brilliant young woman with her own demons named Lisbeth Salander.

Henrik Vanger, the man having Blomkvist wants to hire Blomkvist to investigate the disappearance of a woman who has been missing for forty years.  BlomKvist agrees and starts to make headway, but needs more help.  Through Vanger’s resources, Blomkvist comes into contact with Lisbeth Salander who proceeds to help him with the mystery.

That’s the premise to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo the latest film from director David Fincher adapted from the novel by Stieg Larsson, as well as from a Swedish film production of the same title.  I’m totally new to this whole thing.  I’ve had the opportunity to watch the Swedish original thanks to Netflix Instant Play, but have decided to hold off, just to see Fincher’s version first.  There will be no comparisons to either the book or the original movie here simply because I have not seen or read either.

But I am a huge fan of Fincher’s and have seen all of his movies.  Fincher makes movies designed to provoke and all with a distinctive visual style.  If there’s any of his movies that The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo most resembles, it has to be Zodiac. Both movies take their time in uncovering their facts and both are meticulous about their methods of investigation.  Both also lean back a bit with Fincher’s visual style, though they are still very good-looking movies.

I found the story and characters of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo to be thoroughly engrossing and I was surprised by just how fast this 2 hour and 40 minute movie seemed to fly by.  Fincher makes every scene count whether it’s in uncovering the mystery or adding more to the characters of Mikael or Lisbeth.

Speaking of those characters, much has been said about Rooney Mara’s performance as Lisbeth, and it really is a terrific performance.  After seeing this and also seeing Mara’s sister Kate as part of the cast of FX’s American Horror Story (she played Hayden on that show) there’s a part of me that would never want to be in the same room as the Mara sisters.  Lisbeth, to me anyway, is not a likable character, but she’s still fascinating to watch and Rooney Mara’s performance is absolutely compelling.  When she’s on-screen, she commands it, even when she’s playing opposite of Daniel Craig.  She is possibly the most disturbing character I’ve seen in any movie all year and huge praise goes to Mara for investing so much of herself in this part to make her so compelling.

Daniel Craig plays Mikael Blomkvist and it’s in no way near  his character of James Bond.  He’s a terrific counter-point to Mara’s Lisbeth and brings a great balance to the course of the investigation.  Near the end of the film, Mikael is in really deep trouble, and the fear that Craig projects is certainly palpable.

Both are backed up with some terrific support.  Christopher Plummer, Stellan Skarsgård, Steven Berkoff, Robin Wright, Joely Richardson and Geraldine James all do great lived-in work with the standouts being Plummer and Skarsgård (who’s certainly having a good year in film with this, his work in Thor and in Lars von Trier’s Melancholia).

But, I do have one minor quibble with the film and it occurs near the end.  There are a few spoilers here, so consider yourself warned and if you want to dodge them, then proceed to the next paragraph.  As part of his agreement with Vanger, Blomkvist has been promised help in reclaiming his good name and getting back at  Wennerström, the man who sent Blomkvist’s career spiraling.  As part of this, Lisbeth has also chosen to help Mikael due to the relationship that has developed between the two throughout the film.  Up until this point, while Lisbeth has certainly been an extreme character, things happen here that stretches credibility quite a bit.  Basically, Lisbeth assumes an entirely new identity complete with a drastic change of appearance and character that goes a little beyond what we’ve seen of her skills up until now.  This whole identity change that she goes through is on the same par as watching Tom Cruise do his disguise work as Ethan Hunt in the Mission: Impossible films.  It seems totally out of place for this whole thing and as such, it put me off of this just a little bit.  Now this isn’t part of the main story though, and it helps wrap up some things with Mikael outside of the main story.  So while it is off-putting, it’s not by any means a deal breaker.

That aside, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is terrific entertainment brought to us by a true master director in David Fincher.  The performances are all outstanding and Rooney Mara will leave an indelible mark after seeing her in this film.  There are some intense sexual and violent situations in the film and it certainly does earn it’s “R” rating.  If that’s off-putting to you then you may want to avoid this.  For all others, then go out and see The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.