The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest, On Blu-ray & DVD, Is Satisfyingly Vengeful

The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest (Music Box Films), out this week on Blu-ray and DVD, is the final book in the trilogy by the late Swedish author Stieg Larsson and probably the least cinematic (story-wise). It is, however, the most satisfying. Beginning where the last book left off, punked-out heroine Lisbeth Salander (Noomi Rapace) is in the hospital with a bullet removed from her head and standing charges of attempted murder of her monstrous father (a few doors down in the same hospital wing). Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist), the crusading journalist of Millennium magazine, has asked his (pregnant) attorney sister to defend her, but Salander's secrets could expose a secret government organization who would make anyone a target in their dangerous pursuit to stifle the truth. This was my favorite of the books because it wrapped up a lot of loose ends and gave comeuppance to some despicable characters --  director Daniel Alfredson does the book justice in that respect. Suspenseful and intriguing as much as the text its based on, it's hard to imagine an American remake capturing the special Swedish nuances as adeptly as this film does.