WEAVING A FAMILIAR STORY
Director Fede Alvarez spins his own web while taking ‘Girl’ franchise down new, exciting path
A USTIN — Fede Alvarez is aware of the problems that come with stepping into the midst of an established film franchise — and trying to craft something different.
“The irony is that people want the same experience,” the director says about his latest film, “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” which opens Friday and continues the cinematic take on the popular Millennium trilogy. “But what’s the point of doing the same thing again. My movie has nothing to do with the style of the original movies.”
Stieg Larsson, who wrote the Millennium trilogy, also known in English-speaking countries as “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” series, died in November 2004. The books were published posthumously and inspired film adaptations in both Swedish and English. The original publishers hired Swedish writer David Lagercrantz to write a fourth book that came out in 2015, which is the basis for Alvarez’s movie and the first made from that title.
So, it’s a chance to execute a different vision. It starts with a new face for “The Girl.” Claire Foy (“The Crown”) plays the lead role of Lisbeth Salander, who was portrayed by Noomi
“My movie has nothing to do with the style of the original movies.” Fede Alvarez, director
Rapace in the Swedish films and Rooney Mara in the Hollywood version of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.” Foy is British, but this film maintains a connection to Larsson’s Scandinavia. “Spider’s Web” features Synnøve Macody Lund, a Norwegian actress best known to domestic audiences for the 2011 film “Headhunters.”
Working with such an impressive and diverse female cast — which also includes Sylvia Hoeks, born in the Netherlands and most recently seen in “Blade Runner 2046,” playing Lisbeth’s sister Camilla Salander, and Vicky Krieps, from Luxembourg, who garnered acclaim for her recent role opposite Daniel DayLewis in “Phantom Thread” — presented challenges to Alvarez in the #MeToo era.
“It was important to me, more than ever, to really listen to my female lead,” Alvarez says. “What was comfortable for her? What was a fair way to shoot certain scenes? To make sure she felt comfortable in the clothes she wore and not prone to exploitation, how much makeup she would wear. What you see on the screen is really what Claire Foy wanted to portray. There’s no unnecessary sexual aspect to the part.
“The books have always been associated with women empowerment. This time we really made the film about Lisbeth. While she’s the central character in the books, they also were about Mikael Blomkvist the journalist,” Alvarez says. “He was the character with an arc. This is the first time it’s really about her, 100 percent.”
That doesn’t mean purists have to worry about this interpretation of this series, about two people trying to solve a decades-old murder mystery and the curious entanglements found along the way.
“What these movies have in common are the books, and my version is faithful to the evolution of the books,” Alvarez says. “There was so much time between the fourth book and the other books that I believe you find that progression.
“The books got pulpier and pulpier as they went. Larsson’s third book is really a departure in tone and pace from the first one.”
“The Girl in the Spider’s Web” keeps the cyber underworld atmosphere of the original while also opening up the story to involve international espionage sponsored by secretive organizations from Sweden and the U.S. Additionally, a criminal group, the members of which display spider tattoos on their arms, figures into the scheme of things.
“The audience always wants a McGuffin,” Alvarez says.
The McGuffin, of course, is an Alfred Hitchcock reference to a plot device that while propelling the protagonist and the story actually has little to do with the actual end goal.
“Me, personally, I didn’t care about the McGuffin,” he adds, referring to the computer software various interested parties seek throughout the film.
For him, the real point of the film was the confrontation between Lisbeth and her sister.
“Hitchcock and Brian De Palma have been filmmakers that always inspired me mostly because they always played with the protocol of thrillers,” he says. “They’re always approaching the story from the flank, but at the center is the main character’s story.
“I try to never be shy and always goes as operatic as I can.”
Alvarez recalls shooting a harrowing chase involving cars and a motorcycle along a winding port road next to water.
“We were shooting on Stockholm streets, and it’s a very expensive place to shoot,” he says. “The chase sequence took two days. I like to operate the camera a lot, which means that I’m on the back of a bike holding a camera on my shoulder. It’s a fun way to make a movie but it can be dangerous.
“You use wider lenses so everything looks larger. You try to use the actors as much as you can, so with Claire, we had rigs that allow us to have the her on the bike at that speed but that doesn’t require that she has the skill of a professional motorcycle rider.”
Some viewers may wonder how much of the technical facts are made up in regards to the spy tech seen in the film.
“The real technology behind hacking and how vulnerable we all are may seem fictional, but we had hacking experts as consultants on the movie to give us guidance,” Alvarez said.
“What you see in the movie is called photogrammertry, and it means when you have more than one camera in a room you can create a 3D rendering of the interior of that space,” says Alvarez about an effect that drives events during a penultimate sequence.
Alvarez already is working on his next project, a sequel to the cult classic Muppet film from 1986, “Labyrinth.”
“We’re working with Lisa Henson, Jim Henson’s daughter. It’s a direct sequel to the original, and it’s interesting because there are not a lot of sequels that are made decades later, maybe ‘Star Wars.’ But it’s a film I would love to make,” he said.
When pressed to reveal details about the character of Jareth the Goblin King (played by David Bowie in “Labyrinth”), Alvarez will only say: “The character of Jareth is a big mystery for a lot of people. If I tell you any more, some Muppets will come to my door and beat me up.”