Tag: nuclear

THE COURIER: THE ANSWER TO STING’S QUESTION

SHORT TAKE:

Breathtaking look at the true story of two ordinary men on opposite sides of the Iron Curtain who risked everything to save our world from mutual nuclear annihilation in the 1960’s.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Not appropriate for younger children because of the brutal look at Communist treatment of political prisoners, but should be an eye-opening experience, and educationally required, from high school age up.

LONG TAKE:

1985, before the Berlin Wall came down, before Reagan finally broke the will of the Communist Politburo, and when the possibility of nuclear war was still a reality, Sting released a song called “Russians”. It’s Slavic melody and haunting lyrics evoked the almost-prayerful lament:

Mister Khushchev said, “We will bury you.
I don’t subscribe to this point of view.
It’d be such an ignorant thing to do —
If the Russians love their children too.”

The music video is here: Russians.

The height of the Cold War was the terrifying and infamous Cuban Missile Crisis of October, 1962. Russia’s imperialistic, trigger-happy, Communist leader Khrushchev placed nuclear missiles on our doorstep, in their political satellite and lackey, Castro’s Cuba. This event precipitated our then President, JFK, to threaten the necessary military response. The Cold War did NOT get hot and The Courier, directed by Dominic Cooke (The Hollow Crown series), recounts how that came about and about to whom we should be thankful.

In the 1980’s, even into my 20’s, I remember having nightmares wherein I would hear bombs whistling towards me KNOWING I was about to die and praying the most intense Hail Marys of my life only to wake, thankful that “IT” had not happened — yet.

The Cold War was eventually won, the Berlin Wall came down and the idea of an imminent nuclear exchange with Russia became a historical footnote and warning. The defeat of Communist Russia came about due to a felicitous combination of events, especially: President Reagan’s hard line stance against the Communists and outspending the Russians in the war effort, (see the “Strategic Defense Initiative” also known as the “Star Wars Program”, a plan Reagan initiated to prevent what he saw as an insane “suicide pact” between America and Russia), and Reagan’s cultivating good relations with Russia’s Gorbachev.

BUT that happy outcome might never have had an opportunity to come to fruition, may have been lost in the radioactive ashes of our lost civilizations, had it not been for the efforts of two men, one on either side of the Iron Curtain, Greville Wynne and Oleg Penkovsky, who formed an unlikely friendship and laid the groundwork for that eventual permanent detente.

In 1960, Greville, an ordinary businessman who frequently traveled and made deals in the Slavic areas, was recruited by MI6 to pose as Penkovsky’s Western business connection and retrieve information from him.

The film, in a script written by Tom O’Connor, whose most notable writing effort to date was the very watchable comedy The Hitman’s Bodyguard, (my review here) evokes, accurately, the grim spectre of nuclear war which hung over everyone for decades.

The Courier features: Benedict Cumberbatch (Dr. Strange, Smaug in The Hobbit, Khan in Star Trek into Darkness, Sherlock, Hamlet) as Wynne; Irish-born Jessie Buckley as Wynne’s wife, Sheila; Merab Ninidze (Bridge of Spies and Homeland) as Penkovsky; Rachel Brosnahan (Blacklist) as the CIA operative, whose Emily Donovan is a composite of people, including the wife of a British Visa officer; and Angus Wright (Father Brown series, Iron Lady, The Crown series), who plays Sir Dickie Franks, Donovan’s British MI6 counterpart and the man who, in the movie, recruits Greville, (but who, in fact, claims not to have had anything to do with Greville’s recruitment).

The acting is excellent. Often, as appropriate in a spy thriller, what is NOT said can speak more volumes than what IS said. Both Ninidze and Cumberbatch do this masterfully, wherein: a facial twitch, a break in eye contact, body language, all inform their characters’ personalities as well as express both what they are saying and what they are trying NOT to say.

The soundtrack by Abel Korzeniowski is symphonic, masterfully reflecting the characters’ interactions. The string section functions like a musical telepathic connection, placing you in the center of the characters’ emotions: deep bass cellos underline the depression engendered by grim Russia, light violin phrases dance staccato in imitation of frantic typewriters or quickly ticking clocks to heighten stress. Another passage is reminiscent of waves on an ocean as dangerous options are tossed back and forth between the players. An almost whimsical and comical circus tune is background for the scene in which Greville is informed by his friend that, not only is he a spy, but wishes to recruit Greville, underlining the gob-smacked way Greville must have felt.

The cinematography by Sean Bobbitt is excellent – dark and foreboding throughout but never obscuring even the smallest visual detail of the story. Bobbit successfully accomplishes what the cinematographer Chung-Hoon Chung failed to accomplish in, coincidentally, another Cumberbatch movie – Current Wars (my review here). Wherein, Chung’s lighting techniques attempted to be period but effectively were simply so DARK they prevented the audience from seeing what was happening, Bobbitt’s style, in The Courier, manages brilliantly to both paint in dark political pallet colors of the 1960’s and, simultaneously, makes every scene crystal clear.

As the story is written, the catalyst for Penkovsky’s decision to release massive amounts of information  to the United States was a desire, yes, for his children to live in freedom and not under the crushing thumb of Communism, but more immediately, for his children to simply SURVIVE, to NOT have to face the prospect of death by radioactive fallout or nuclear incineration.

While it’s, obviously, no spoiler to tell you their efforts were successful in preventing the Cuban Missile Crisis from precipitating a nuclear holocaust, how they did it is a fascinating journey. We should know our history or be doomed to repeat it. And tribute should be made to the men who offered everything they had and were to pave the way for this instead of this — for the love of their children.

May God bless and rest their souls.

AD ASTRA – A VERY DIFFERENT KIND OF SCI FI

SHORT TAKE:

Journey by a son in search of his father, set in space.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Older teens minimum for some language but mostly scenes of violence and the resulting dangers one might expect in tackling hard space. There is no sexual content.

LONG TAKE:

Ad Astra (meaning “to the stars”) directed by James Gray, one of the writers, is a very interesting movie but not about what you might think. Ad Astra could have taken place as a western, underwater, in a haunted abandoned funhouse, a post-apocalyptic wasteland, in any normal day of a big city, or climbing a mountain. The writers James Gray and Ethan Gross chose to place this well told story in space and it is as good a backdrop as any of the others would have been. Combining allegory with pragmatic and brutal realism, Ad Astra plays out more like the Greek epic of discovery, The Odyssey or the Christian parable Pilgrim’s Progress, than a conventional science fiction story. Gray, writer/director, himself has compared his story to Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

SPOILERS – BUT MINOR AND OBLIQUELY AS I CAN

The story is about Roy McBride, a top-flight astronaut, played by Brad Pitt (most recently in the wonderful role of a protective stuntman in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood), whose father, Clifford, disappeared 16 years before. Roy’s father played by Tommy Lee Jones (Men in Black, The Fugitive, Captain America) is a brilliant scientist who went in search of evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence, then fell off the radar after leaving Saturn.

A series of catastrophic electronic storms have recently begun to devastate Earth. The Surges, as they are referred to, seem to be emanating from Neptune, and are suspected to be linked to Clifford’s disappearance. Roy is sent out to investigate with his father’s old partner, Thomas Pruitt, played by acting veteran Donald Sutherland.

As an aside, I am a big fan of Donald Sutherland. Sutherland’s career dates back almost six decades. Playing opposite the likes of Robert Duvall, Helen Mirren, Orson Welles, Gene Wilder, and Julie Christie, his career includes an incredibly eclectic collection of almost two hundred entries, ranging from comic to horror to personal drama. His resume includes everything from classics like Hamlet and Pride and Prejudice, to monster movies like the bad  Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors and the brilliant Invasion of the Body Snatchers, military black comedies like M.A.S.H. and Kelly’s Heroes, deeply emotional personal dramas like Ordinary People, the modern dystopian franchise The Hunger Games, screwball comedies like Start The Revolution Without Me, straight war movies like The Dirty Dozen and Eye of The Needle, and avant garde suspense like Don’t Look Now – the list goes on and on, and it was a pleasure to see him again even in a small character part.

Rounding out the cast is Ruth Negga (the prickly – in more ways than one – antagonist in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) as Helen Santos, an ally who appears, like a messenger from a Greek myth, to provide Roy information he needs to urge him along his quest. Another character who hands Roy along like a baton is Colonel Levant played by Sean Blakemore. Liv Tyler (Lord of the Rings, Armageddon – so not Tyler’s first rodeo as a character enamored of a space cowboy) is Eve (to Roy’s Adam? – perhaps representing all mankind and their errors) the girl Roy leaves behind as Roy seems compelled as a lemming, without his father’s guidance, to repeat his father’s mistakes.

However, Ad Astra is not really about the search for Roy’s father, but ultimately an insightful, honest and frank inner journey undertaken by Roy to conquer the demons left behind by Clifford’s abandonment of Roy’s family.

Modern culture tries to expunge the need for a father in the home. Ad Astra highlights, at least in part, the fallacy of this destructive philosophy.

The tone of the film reminds me of, and owes a lot to, Stanley Kubrick’s groundbreaking but ethereally distant 2001: A Space Odyssey, which created a mythology about mankind’s leaps of progress. In contrast, Ad Astra is relatable, in that it is told from the intimate point of view of one man’s personal evolution. The pace of Ad Astra is very slow and deliberate, arguably even sometimes dull. But such adagio of movement is necessary for the contemplatively atmosphere necessary for this pensive tale.

The events that transpire during the course of the film are anything but boring. The theme of obstacles structure the story and manifest in every way you can imagine: verbal, bureaucratic, intentionally hostile, the indifference of nature, clandestine, emotional, instinctive brutality, and the simple fact of the mind-numbingly immense distances required to complete Roy’s journey.

The cinematography is magnificent. The depiction of the outer planets is stunning and awe-inspiring and brilliantly conveys the overwhelming majestic size of space itself, underscoring the enormity of the pilgrimage that Roy undertakes.

And pilgrimage Roy’s trip truly is. A pilgrimage of discovery. The pilgrim nature of Roy’s quest is underscored by the occasional but respectful and deliberate references to traditional Christian theology and belief. The spiritual nature of Roy’s expedition is also demonstrated by the way the writers strip Roy, piece by piece, of his armor plating – literally and figuratively, physically and emotionally – until he must confront his destiny as any questing knight must – face to face and alone. Roy’s progress is cleverly documented by way of periodic psychological tests he must take and pass in order to continue his journey. This serves as both a practical plot device as well as a metaphysical manifestation of Roy’s inner progress.

The music by Max Richter is both triumphal and eerily beautiful, contributing to the contemplative feel of this mystery.

Ad Astra is not for everyone. It’s not properly a science fiction story, though it is set in a pragmatic future vision of human-conquering space. But it is far more violent than the average audience for a movie which primarily deals with inner analysis.

So go see Ad Astra if you are of the right age and want to see a thoughtful, meditative but dangerous odyssey. But go without any preconceived notions, for it is not the kind of science fiction movie you might expect, but approach it as you might a friend mulling over a retreat inspired epiphany which he wants to share.

GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS – WONDERFULLY POLITICIALLY INCORRECT COMIC BOOK-STYLE CREATURE FEATURE

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION FOR REVIEW OF GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS

SHORT TAKE:

If you are a fan of Godzilla then you will love this contribution to the now 65 year old franchise.

WHO SHOULD GO:

At youngest, younger teens, for: frightening and extensively violent images of city-wide destruction, human peril and cataclysmic fight scenes with other monsters. There is also some language including one “f” word and blasphemy. And while there is no sexuality shown, there are a small handful of sexual innuendos spoken, which will probably go over the head of most younger teens. There is also a confusing mish mash of paganism and Christian religious symbols and references which could confuse a spiritually immature child.

LONG TAKE:

In 1954 Godzilla inexplicably and emphatically became a cult hit. A rubber suited man emitting a now iconic shriek (created by Akira Ifukube rubbing a resin coated leather glove across the strings of a double bass) wrecks havoc, clumping awkwardly as he lazer-breathes his way through towns and countrysides behind fleeing crowds of (mostly) Japanese victims.

35 films later (all but 3 made by Toho, a Japanese-based film company), the franchise is still going strong. The latest, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, is a loose sequel to the 2014 Hollywood film which firmly established Godzilla to mainstream American audiences as a “good guy” ally to humanity. In point of fact, some Japanese philosophies even see Godzilla as an indifferent “god” of destruction in a cycle of death and rebirth.

At one point a scientist, upon seeing the monster in full, interjects the name of the Lord, to which Rick Stanton (Bradley Whitford – Get Out, Saving Mr. Banks, Cabin in the Woods) punnily follows up with “zilla”. In fact the name Godzilla was never meant to refer to our Creator. It was actually a Europeanized mispronunciation of the Japanese, Gojira, which, in turn refers to an animal which is akin to both a whale and a gorilla.

SPOILERS – but, I mean, come on, this is Godzilla and there’s not that much plot to spoil.

In this outing, Godzilla is a bit of both ally and destructo-machine, as he tromps over the Earth with 16 other “Titans”. The human subplot, which is supposed to keep us grounded to the big critters, involves scientists Mark and Emma Russell, (Kyle Chandler – Game Night, Argo, King Kong and Vera Farmiga – The Nun, Conjuring 2) who lost their son in the first Godzilla movie, (flashback) then divorced. Emma is now brainwashing, I mean raising, their remaining child Madison (the clearly talented Millie Bobby Brown who is the amazing “11” from Stranger Things) to follow in her tunnel vision footsteps, putting her research of the Titans above everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) else.

Rounding out the cast is Ken Watanabe (Inception, Last Samurai, previous Godzilla, Pokémon Detective Pickachu), Charles Dance (staple in film and TV for 45 years, bringing a wicked class and style to everything from Game of Thrones to Shakespeare and a villain in the James Bond franchise), Sally Hawkins (in both the offensively awful Shape of Water and the extremely delightful Paddington movies), and Joe Morton, (whose career dates all the way back to 1951 including the innovative cult sci fi Brother From Another Planet and the classic Terminator 2: Judgement Day).

The rest of the run time is spent watching CGI monsters destroy each other in admittedly spectacular fashion, although a lot of cheating is done in the details by holding all the fights at night, under water or in a Cat 6 (???) hurricane manufactured by one of the “bad guy” Titans.

It occurred to me as I perused a Youtube which did a quick survey of all the Godzilla movies, that the phenomenon of Godzilla has much in common with the Lego movies. Aside from the 1998 Matthew Broderick contribution, which envisioned Godzilla as a more “realistic” mountain-sized Komodo Dragon, Godzilla reminds me of an action figure. Despite all the CGI available, the director, Michael Doughtery, (Superman Returns and a couple of X-Men movies) chose to stick with the stilted, squat, awkwardly moving Godzilla instead of the 1998 lithe, quick and sinuous monster which chased Matthew Broderick through New York City. Similarly to the Lego Movie, which sees the world from the point of view of the toys, Godzilla strikes me as inspired by the imaginations of every child who had a monster toy with which they liked to terrorize their surroundings. The traditional Godzilla MOVES like an action figure with an inverted triangle body, whippy tail with which to bludgeon objects, and tiny useless arms, clumping from side to side as it stomps forward crushing everything under foot in its path – except the “important” actors. The end credits even camp it up, featuring a cover by Bear McCreary of the 1977 Blue Oyster Cult novelty song “Godzilla”.

This is a pulp funny book brought to full Technicolor life with all of the shallowness of plot, disjointed explanations, magic-style “science”, inconsistent character motivations, and single note personalities of a comic book and its denizens. Even so, this is not meant as a criticism or failure of the movie. I suspect this is what the film makers were after. And it succeeds, as such, admirably, throwing in a little wry humor dialogue now and again just to keep things “real”.

As a matter of fact, there is one special reason why I, personally, like this movie. In a delightfully refreshing turn of events, a truth is demonstrated. The monsters have been deliberately set forth to destroy mankind by a recognizably legitimate force for evil, one which wrecks havoc on us in the real world on a daily basis – the Environmental Wacko. The bad guys here boldly state that humans are a “virus” on the Earth which must be scoured off, in their way of thinking, to allow the world to return to its “natural” state. But, of course, in true and honestly portrayed, narcissistic liberal hypocritical fashion, the villain, after murdering tens of thousand of men, women and children with these behemoths, she willing puts all her plans on hold when it is her child at risk. No one else’s child is important though, only hers and hers alone.

Her insane scheme to find and release the Titans upon the Earth is understood by the rest of the characters in the movie as: ridiculous, evil, short sighted, cruel, and – ultimately, flat out wrong. This, of course, can sum up the entire mentality of the extreme environmentalist movement, which wants to put animals above people, prefers human suffering for OTHERS (who are not members of their extreme club) to widespread use of modern inventions, ignores common sense science (like the fact that carbon dioxide is GOOD for the environment as plants LOVE it), proposes hoaxes which further their agenda with NO verifiable evidence (like human caused climate change) but continue to jet around the world using up fossil fuels at a rate the rest of us can only dream about. It’s nice to see the blame placed at the feet of those to which it really belongs for a change.

Godzilla also leans heavily on paganism, reverencing and even calling to some worship of the monsters. That being said there is also some comparisons of Godzilla to Christian motifs – that he died trying to save us, descended to the depths of the Earth and was reborn to arise and defeat an evil monster (well two if you count the environmental wacko). While this has been done appropriately and respectfully in stories like Narnia (NOT that Godzilla even belongs in the same solar system with Aslan), it is a fair point to say not all of Godzilla is pagan, but that there are at least some superficial nods to a Christ-like theology, though it is obvious that the writers neither understand it nor fully embrace it.

So if you are familiar with and are a fan of the mythos of Godzilla then you will not be disappointed in Godzilla: King of the Monsters. But while you should be advised of the heavily pagan-favored worldview, it will at least provide a breath of politically incorrect but common sense-accurate fresh air.

GIRL IN THE SPIDER’S WEB: FROM ANGSTY BOOK TO ACTION ADVENTURE MOVIE

 

I am delighted to present another review by my sister, Wynne, this time co-authored with her friend Mike.

Click on the title to check out Wynne's previous review of another unusual movie, The Florida Project.

SHORT TAKE:

Action adventure based on the fourth of five books from the Millenium series and sequel to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Older teens and up for violence, sexual content, and language.

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LONG TAKE:

The Girl in the Spider's Web is based on the fourth book in the Millennium series. The first three books were written by Stieg Larrson. After his death the series was continued by David Lagercrantz. The Girl in the Spider’s Web is Lagercrantz’ first installment in the series. This is the second American movie from the series, the first was The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The book and the movie follow the same characters but the movie does have a different story line.

Lagercrantz seems to have studied the Larrson books. The characters have perhaps evolved but not changed. Where there is evolution in the characters or relationships, it is natural, as any author might do with characters created in previous books, such as Michael Connelly's detective creation Harry Bosch. Lagercrantz emulates Larrson's complex and intriguing plots quite well.

Three actresses have played Lisbeth Salander, and each brings a slightly different take on the character. Naomi Rapace starred as Lisbeth in the Swedish production of the first three books: The Girl: With the Dragon Tattoo, Who Played with Fire and Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, as well as the TV miniseries Millenium. Rooney Mara plays Lisbeth in the Hollywood production of the first book The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Now Claire Foy takes on the role of Lisbeth in the Hollywood production of the fourth book in the Millennium Series, The Girl in the Spider's Web. We have read four of the books in the Millennium Series. There is a fifth book, An Eye for an Eye, which we have not read yet. All three actresses are similar physically to the Lisbeth in the book: slight in stature, tough, dark figures, who can effectively convey plenty of angst.

Naomi Rapace, in the 2009 Swedish production of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, portrays a more vulnerable Lisbeth, with angst and grit. The movie had thirty-five nominations and eighteen wins from various awards, with Rapace winning BAFTA’s Best Leading Actress award in 2011. Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie 86%. Reviews in Rotten Tomato applauded: "Rapace's gripping performance makes The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo an unforgettable viewing experience" and admired that she was a "haunting, enigmatic Lisbeth".

We have not seen the Hollywood version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, so we will rely on reviews. Rooney Mara won an Oscar as Best Actress in 2012. The movie had a total of ninety nominations and twenty-eight wins for various awards. Rotten tomatoes gave the movie an 80%. Reviews in Rotten Tomatoes stated that Mara gave "total role commitment" and a "brilliant, revelatory performance".

When a re-boot of the Millennium Series, with The Girl in the Spider's Web, was considered, the Swedish actress, Naomi Rapace, decided to pass. Rooney Mara said she wanted to return as Lisbeth, but the studio decided to go with a different director and cast.

In the latest production, Lisbeth Salander is brilliantly portrayed by Claire Foy of The Crown. Foy has played three different roles in movies that we have seen. In The Crown she plays The Queen, Elizabeth, as a young woman. She portrays Neil Armstrong's wife, who supports her husband in his endeavor to be an astronaut in First Man, giving a strong performance depicting the stress of being an astronaut's wife. And now she is Lisbeth Salander.

SPOILERS

Lisbeth and Camilla Salander are fraternal twin sisters, raised by their father, a Russian crime lord and head of the Spider Society. He physically and psychologically abused them both. Lisbeth wants them both to escape, but Camilla chooses to stay with her father. So Lisbeth escapes alone. The choices made at that moment result in the twin sisters taking different life paths. Much like in the old classic Angels With Dirty Faces, the question hangs over both the characters' lives and the movie of: had they both escaped (in Angels, from the police, in Spider, from their abusive father) would their lives have been different?

In the first book, Lisbeth's first guardian is a kind man. When her first guardian becomes ill, she is turned over to a second guardian who sexually and physically abuses her. As a teen she decides to take matters into her own hands and not be abused any more. With her abilities as a tech genius and computer hacker she becomes a vigilante, taking the law into her own hands. She will stop at nothing to bring justice to the abused and mistreated. She chooses the path of good.

Left alone with a sadistic and abusive father, Camilla evolves into a cold-blooded killer, becoming the head of the Spiders, following in her father's footsteps. The Spiders are a ruthless group that will stop at nothing to get what they want, including murder. She chooses the path of evil.

Camilla did not enjoy the few short years of kindness that Lisbeth had. Did this difference push each into the direction that their lives went? Camilla blames Lisbeth for the years of abuse she underwent with her father and questions why Lisbeth did not rescue her. Camilla cannot understand that the real villain is their father.

The movie's main theme revolves around who can get control of the computer program, Firewall, a program that can access codes for nuclear weapons worldwide. There are four groups in the race. One of the players is Lisbeth working for Frans Balder, played by Stephen Merchant, (mostly known for his comedy in shows like The Big Bang Theory and the British version of The Office), whose autistic son, August (Christopher Convery), is gifted and sought after by competing interests. Another is Camilla Salander, played by Sylvia Hoeks, (the evil replicant Luv from Blade Runner 2049) who is hired by the Swedish Security Police (SAPO). Then there is deputy director of SAPO, Gabriella Grane, played by Synnove Macody Lund (previously a model, journalist and film critic). Finally, an American National Security Agent (NSA) programmer and sniper, Ed Needham, played by Lakeith Stanfield, (appearing in the acclaimed Get Out and recently in Sorry to Bother You) is also in the hunt. All want to obtain Firewall for different reasons.

Frans Balder wrote the program, then was fired from the NSA. He hires Lisbeth Salander to steal it back. Camilla, the leader of the Spiders, the bad guys, wants control of the program to launch nukes and frame Lisbeth. The Swedish Security Police wants the program because Sweden has not been in a war in recent history and considers itself a neutral country, which will keep the world safe. The American NSA programmer and hacker, Ed Needham, wants the program returned to the United States.

It would be difficult to compare the book with the movie because they are so different. The characters are the same, Frans is still murdered, and poor August is still the pawn going back and forth between the groups. While the book’s plot has no computer program like Firewall, it does include a chase after government secrets. We liked both the movie and the book. We did think the movie had more action. The book was more mental.

August in the book and the movie has two savant talents. One is mathematics and another is drawing. In the book, August’s talent as an artist is used to help find his father's killer. In the movie, his talent as a mathematical genius is the key to cracking the code that will open Firewall. We thought it was interesting that each version highlighted a different talent.

When the two sisters come face to face, toward the end of the movie, Camilla blames Lisbeth for how her life evolved and the years of abuse she endured. She is out for revenge. Lisbeth tearfully replies that Camilla chose to stay with their father. Again, if Camilla had chosen to escape with Lisbeth as children would her life have been different? Would Camilla still be a psychopath? The debate of nature vs. nurture plays out with the two sisters.

The movie got a 41% from Rotten Tomatoes. They felt that the movie had an "uninspired story and poor character development," and that the movie turned Lisbeth into a "generic action hero". Rolling Stone noted that Claire Foy was "killer good" as Lisbeth Salander.

We liked seeing Lisbeth come to life on the big screen, done especially well by Claire Foy. The movie had plenty of special effects – lots of explosions and fires, stabbing people with needles delivering different serums to sedate or blind or kill, and the use of a cattle prod is very popular in the movie. The sequence with the sniper, Ed Needham, shooting the thermal images of men inside the walls of a building shown in 3-D was truly exceptional. There are car chases over beautiful Scandinavian scenery, with dark old buildings giving an eerie affect in contrast. Many special tech devices are used and you wonder if they really do exist somewhere. Lisbeth has an endless supply of devices that can operate just about anything electronically, any of which would inspire envy among the Star Trek crew.

In an interview by Aubrey Page on HUFFPOST done with the director Fede Alvarez, he states, "It's not Lisbeth Salander the assistant or Lisbeth Salander the muse. This time it's Lisbeth Salander the main character that really drives the story". He wanted to place Lisbeth in the forefront and not as Blomkvist sidekick.

Reviews compare the movie to the James Bond series. Except for the massive explosions and techy gadgets, We did not make the connection. The two characters are very different. James Bond is a suave, martini drinking, secret agent, who always ends up with the woman. Lisbeth is a dark, bisexual, tech savvy loner whose only friends are Mikael Blomkvist, a former lover, played by Swedish actor Sverrir Gudnason, and a computer geek, Plague, played by Cameron Britton.

In reviews there is also reference to Lisbeth being portrayed as an action figure. This somewhat trivializes her abilities and makes her appear as a comic book character. Will there be action figures coming out for Christmas? This would be sad because there is a lot more to Lisbeth than that.

Another complaint from reviewers is that Camilla's character is not fleshed out more, that she should be presented as a more interesting and complex character than Lisbeth. But Camilla only even shows up in the second half of the movie. The movie missed an opportunity in this regard. Nor does the movie portray Lisbeth with as much depth as do the books. We believe the movie was more into action and special effects than character portrayal. But we really enjoy action movies, so this is why we enjoyed both the movie and the book for different reasons.

In the book, Camilla did not die at the end. Maybe she didn't in the movie, we only see her step off a cliff and fall through the clouds.

Another reference in reviews is made to the #METOO movement, but remember the book was written in 2015 before #METOO. A scene near the beginning of the movie does show Lisbeth has become: "the girl who hurts men who hurt women". But in the rest of the movie she is on a different quest.

As we stated earlier, we like the book and we liked the movie. For the movie, you have to turn your brain off a bit and live in her world and just believe she can do all she does. We agree with critics that this is mainly an action movie and characters could have been developed more. But good special effects on the big screens are great fun. Of course, (this is Wynne now) my favorite kind of movie has bad ass dinosaurs creating havoc in the world. But that is not in this movie.

The movie is rated R because of violence, language and sexual content. So, take your older teens to go see this movie but leave the kiddos at home.