In 2011, David Fincher (Fight Club, Se7en) co-wrote and directed an adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s highly acclaimed Swedish crime novel The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo starring Daniel Craig (Skyfall) as troubled journalist-turned-detective Mikael Blomkvist and Rooney Mara (Her) as badass hacker Lisbeth Salander. Despite reaping a tonne of money and award nominations the general consensus is that Sony regarded the movie as a failure.
Speaking recently to the Swedish press while on tour promoting his latest film Gone Girl, Fincher provided a small update on the proposed sequel The Girl Who Played With Fire: “I think because [Sony] already has spent millions of dollars on the rights and the script so it will result in something. The script that we now have [has] a huge potential, I can reveal as much as it is extremely different from the book.”
The assumption was that a second and third movie would instantly follow the original English language version and be filmed back-to-back but Sony has held off negotiations due to the first movie not making as much as they intended. Fincher’s comments suggest that the script has been reworked since its first inception and that it will eventually get the green light. Although he has yet to comment on whether he’d be involved it would be hard to see anyone else take the mantle from him. A stumbling block could of course be the busy schedules that the director and both leading actors currently have planned ahead.
Gavin Logan – Follow me on Twitter
