The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest 
by A. Faulkner
Final installments of great trilogies tend to disappoint (Godfather III, anyone?). This is not the case with The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, the third and final film of the Millennium Trilogy by the late Stieg Larsson dealing with the brutal victimization of his great female protagonist, Lisbeth Salander. Moving seamlessly between flashbacks of the first two films (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire), director Daniel Alfredson’s visualization of Larsson’s passion play portrays seasoned deceivers and their numerous unnerving acts of evil with precision and clarity while never losing sight of the one person set to bring down this evil empire—Lisbeth.
After being institutionalized in her youth for setting her abusive father on fire, Lisbeth spends the rest of her life paying for this retaliation against the man who abused her family and left her mother with severe brain damage. The father, Alexander Zalachenko (a scarily good Georgi Staykov), turns out to be a Soviet spy and sex-trafficker turned Nordic-Nazi with bigger ties to true monsters responsible for incredible acts of violence, terror and government control. While the stories may seem to reach too far, Larsson knows what he is talking about. Taking cues from his own world of left-wing, anti-Nazi journalism, the Millennium Trilogy uncovers the same conspiracy theories and deep-cover governmental evil related to journalistic realities in a seemingly neutral Sweden.Beginning where The Girl Who Played with Fire left off, Lisbeth has literally come back from her grave to put an end to her father by trial after the ax to his head failed to accomplish that result. Played by Noomi Rapace, Lisbeth is a heroically damaged yet resilient hacker turned heroine. Despite her tiny frame, she is nearly a superhero—surviving torture by government-appointed doctors, rape by appointed guardians, brutality, a shot in the head by her father! Quite literally she is the life of a movie convoluted with conspiracy theories so deep it’s easy to question how much more the audience can take before Lisbeth finds justice.
Lisbeth works much like the brilliantly dark, resourceful and intriguing powerhouse leads who fit the female molds in a Quentin Tarantino film (easily making the girls from Death Proof look like sissies). Lisbeth gets far less action in the finale than fans will want, though she does make quite an appearance in her courtroom getups, letting her bisexual-Goth-punk-freak flag fly in the form of a very Edward Scissorhands aesthetic.
Back to save the day is Mikael Blomkvist, a believable Michael Nyqvist, the Millennium journalist whom Lisbeth saved in the first installment, seduced and in whom she at last has found a true friend. Supplementing the strong female presence in the series is the return of Mikael’s editor and sometime lover, Erika Berger (the wonderful Lena Endre). It is she who must make the tough decisions when faced with terror spilling from the courtroom to the Millennium offices as Mikael works desperately to uncover the many lies that have victimized Lisbeth for so long in order to give her freedom.
While all the loose ends are tied up nicely in The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, it’s a must to watch the first two films; the plot may seem slow and thick unless you’ve waited as long as Lisbeth has for justice. America is finally getting in on the action, with David Fincher (The Social Network) slated to direct the first film in the series with Daniel Craig as Mikael and Rooney Mara as Lisbeth, but don’t wait for the translation. This is a series worth your time now.
