The 26-year-old Rooney Mara is currently taking Hollywood by storm with her starring role as Lisbeth Salander in David Fincher’s “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”.

Directed by David Fincher, with whom Mara previously worked on 2010’s “The Social Network”, ‘Dragon Tattoo’ is the English-language adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s Swedish-language novel of the same name. It centres around Mara’s character, Lisbeth Salander, and Daniel Craig’s character, Mikael Blomkvist, and has already been nominated for Best Picture by the Producers Guild of America.

However, the true success story in this film lies with Rooney Mara, who has so far received Golden Globe and National Board of Review nominations for her performance; and is already experiencing early Oscar buzz. This film is by no means Mara’s introduction into the entertainment industry – she has made numerous television guest appearances in recent years, ranging from an assault victim “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” to a patient in two episodes of “ER”.

Yet with her latest film, Rooney Mara has entered into a new level of celebrity. Not only has she received numerous accolades and been cast alongside Ryan Gosling, Christian Bale and Cate Blanchette in the upcoming drama “Lawless;” but she has also experienced her first dose of media backlash.

In a recent interview with Allure, Mara referred to her “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” appearance as:

“[S]o awful. So stupid. People are obsessed with that show. I don’t get it. It’s ridiculous … they sodomized [my character]. I mean, I’ve been sodomized since the beginning of my career. I should have known then it would come full circle.”

Mara was later forced to release a statement clarifying her words, explaining to The Huffington Post that:

“That was my first job. It couldn’t have been more exciting for me. It’s an experience I hold very dear to my heart. People take things out of context, and that’s just not the case. I was more nervous doing that job than I was doing this job … I know that ‘Law & Order’ makes their episodes out of real things that are happening in the city, so to me, by “ridiculous” I meant that humanity is ridiculous. People are awful to one another; and to me, I find it ridiculous.”

Rooney Mara is by no means the first young actress to insist that she was misquoted in an interview, but it does show that her ‘celebrity’ status has reached the point where the public are paying attention to what she does, says, wears and chooses as her next project.

Regarding her next project, aside from the completion of “Lawless,” Mara does not have anything officially greenlit into production; however, she is contracted to reprise her role as Lisbeth Salander in the potential second and third films in Sony’s series.

What remains to be seen for the time being is how Rooney Mara fares in awards season. The nominations for the 84th Academy Awards are set to be announced on January 24th, and plenty of eyes are sure to be on Mara as she competes to make it into the Academy’s final shortlist for Best Actress. For Rooney Mara, 2012 could soon become the year for ‘The Girl with the Infinite Opportunities’.

Image Courtesy of   https://www.facebook.com/DragonTattoo

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Many people become upset when Hollywood sets out to remake beloved, classic movies. Right now, Hollywood is in a remake frenzy as Fright Night, Let the Right One In, Conan The Barbarian, Footloose, Arthur, and many more are being or have been remade. Hollywood has stepped on too many toes with their ever-growing remake list as The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is to be remade.

David Fincher is set to direct the film but many believe this is not going to save the film’s image as being “just another remake.” In the first filming of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Noomi Rapace plays the role of main character Lisbeth Salander and earned many awards and nominations around the world.

Along with her nominations and wins, came the critical acclaim of the job she did in the movie. Before shooing the movie, Rapace had sat down with Charlie Rose to discuss her preparation plans for playing the role of Slander. “I wanna go all the way, I wanna do my stunts, I wanna change my body, do the piercings, i want to get my license for motorcycles,” Rapace said.

Even though she did a great job as Salander the first time around, and many critics — including Roger Ebert — wanted Rapace to reprise the role in the remake. Rapace turned down the idea of returning. With Rapace now out of the spotlight, eyes turned to young 21-year old actor, Rooney Mara, who had big shoes to fill.

Mara is most well known for her role as Erica Albright in The Social Network and as Taggarty in Youth in Revolt. Even with her previous work with Fincher, many people are skeptical that she can live up to Rapace’s take on the character of Salander. However, Mara has been taking steps that Rapace took in order to get into character such as dying her hair and piercing her nipples.

Alongside Mara will be Daniel Craig, playing the journalist Mikael Blomkvist who tries to track down a missing girl related to a big business tycoon, Henrik Vanger. Craig told Esquire that the movie would be an extremely graphic film.“[David] Fincher, he’s not holding back. They’ve given him free rein. He showed me some scenes recently, and my hand was over my mouth,” Craig said.

David Fincher has directed gritty, dirty thrillers before; Fight Club, Seven and Panic Room are just a few. So with a good amount of experience in the mystery thriller genre, many would expect the hype to go through the roof. Yet, more people are jumping on the pessimistic bandwagon as the release date creeps closer and closer.

Many believe that Rapace cannot be replaced and that Hollywood should not remake a movie that was done so well the first time. However, Fincher’s spin on the tale would seem to prick the ears up on some who are willing to oversee the lack of Noomi Rapace and watch Mara’s take on Salander’s dark character.

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Stieg Larsson’s internationally acclaimed novel “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” will, once again, hit the big screen worldwide this winter in a most-anticipated re-make of the enigmatic story – this time by the hand of David Fincher. The green band trailer was released by Sony last week but shortly before, fans and curious spectators were buzzing with excitement over a “leaked”/camera-captured red band trailer – which was subsequently pulled off of youtube. One day later, the US green band version appeared online but the word had already spread – a pitch-perfect example of viral marketing.

Blogger Todd Brown commented on the site twitchfilm.com that “Sony’s handling of the trailer release feels to me like on of the great recent moves in viral marketing – think about it, who announces that they’re putting a red band trailer in theaters but not releasing it then sits quietly for days while a suspiciously high quality version of that same trailer racks up massive traffic and chatter online? It’s a classic case of creating desire by ‘denying’ access.”

Fincher’s version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is expected to turn out notably different from Niels Arden Oplev’s 2009 take on the popular book. The Golden Globe-winning director has re-cast Rooney Mara (fresh off The Social Network) as the dark and hard-hitting Lisbeth Salander while Daniel Craig stars as Michael Blomkvist, the journalist who gets tangled up in the web of terror behind a young girl’s disappearance.

The announcement of the American remake made quite a stir initially when it was revealed that the Oscar-winning screenwriter Steven Zaillian, who was to pen the American version, had crafted a new ending to the revered work. According to slashfilm.com, “fans of Larsson’s work have been very vocal with their disappointment” and according to an article by Lynn Hirschberg in W Magazine, Fincher’s version does admittedly depart rather dramatically from the book.

“Blomkvist is less promiscuous, Salander is more aggressive, and, most notably, the ending—the resolution of the drama—has been completely changed. This may be sacrilege to some, but Zaillian has improved on Larsson—the script’s ending is more interesting.”

So – should Larsson fans forego the remake?

If you were one of the few who managed to catch a glimpse of the red band trailer – heck, if you’ve had the chance to peek at the official trailer – it does actually look good. Very good.

Draped over a rough and stormy Karen O-cover of Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song, the preview of Fincher’s Dragon Tattoo is a dazzling glimpse into the darkness that looms in Larsson’s universe. The final result will most likely prove darker than what the reserved and delicate Scandinavian storytelling tradition is used to, but like last year’s Let Me In (not to mention a wide array of Spanish, Japanese and Korean horror and thriller films), American cinema has a way of taking something foreign and translating it into Hollywood. For better or for worse.

Some may continue to curse the day Fincher laid eyes on Larsson’s work but if you read the book and saw the 2009 adaptation, another take may not be such a bad idea. The character of Lisbeth Salander is becoming an iconic figure of anti-hero(ine)ism – and a refreshingly grim one I might add. The more interpretations we get of her troubled fictional existence, the deeper we may venture into her mind. Fans of the books will have to admit that the first movie was a good, but superficial, interpretation of the original story’s complexity and suspense. A remake may add a new layer to its visualization.

With a promising trailer out, Dragon Tattoo fans should let go of their reservation and at least give the upcoming adaptation a chance – it won’t be the book and it won’t be the 2009 movie; The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by David Fincher is going to leave a whole new set of marks this December.

Image provided by Naír la jefa

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