The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is the third installment of the Millennium Trilogy of Swedish films about the attempts of hacker Lisbeth Salander and journalist Mikael Blomkvist. With the first film they set about solving a cold murder case and stumbled upon a larger conspiracy involving high-powered Swedish businessmen and politicians. As they further investigated the matter in the second film, they discovered part of the conspiracy involved Lisbeth’s father, who was, until then, believed dead. Now, in this third installment, as Lisbeth stands trial for some of her deeds thusfar, pandora’s conspiracy box is fully open and the shit has officially hit the fan.

This is a darn good flick, better than the second, but not quite up to the level of the first. As a stand-alone film, it’s so-so, not bad, but nothing all that great. As the cap on the trilogy, I thought it was very enjoyable. They did a great job of summing things up and answered the unanswered questions. Like many of the final flicks in serials, it’s more about finishing the story than it is about creating a great stand-alone story, so it doesn’t bother me all that much that it’s not bullet proof.

The acting continues to be great, especially Noomi Rapace and Michael Nyqvist. The story was engaging and interesting. I do wish they’d had more interaction with Blomkvist and Salander, but they had to be faithful to the book and at least there was more in this one than number two. If you like tight conspiracy-based thrillers, watch all three, this one included, but especially the first one.

S’good