Coming Soon
'The Girl in the Spider's Web' Sneak Peek With Claire Foy and Director Fede Alvarez
User Rating: 5 / 5
- Details
- Category: Exclusive
- Published: Wednesday, 19 September 2018 00:48
Sony Pictures treated CineMovie and other press to 20 minutes of footage from THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB Tuesday at the Los Angeles studio lot with Claire Foy and director Fede Alvarez (DON'T BREATHE, EVIL DEAD) in attendance for a Q&A afterwards. Alvarez revealed this installment will focus primarily on Lisbeth Salander with Mikael Blomkvist taking a back seat to the computer hacker. The newly crowned Best Actress Emmy winner for Netflix's "The Crown" also pushed for a non-sexual character while the director admits the #MeToo movement had an impact on his thinking when it comes to female characters.
From the 20 minutes of footage screened, THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB has everything from intrigue, dilemma, some really good action and Lisbeth looking bad ass in some harrowing motorcycle stunts.
The first scene previewed started with the scene of a man apologizing to his wife for beating her. Previous trailers show what transpires in that scene where Lisbeth comes in and strings up the abuser. The next scene has Lisbeth standing under the shower head clearly affected by her actions as her hands shake. She's still clearly affected by the memories of past abuse. As tough as she looks on the exterior, Claire Foy really captures Lisbeth's vulnerability.
In the next scene, Lisbeth goes to a club to forget her troubles and then it cuts to the next morning in her studio (more like a lair) with a female lover and friend. The friend asks about her sister, and Lisbeth lets loose her emotions and anger towards her father and sister which is rare for the hacker to reveal information about herself. She then receives a new assignment.
Lisbeth meets with a new client played by Stephen Merchant who wants her to hack a government agency to retrieve his work on a dangerous new program.
We're briefly introduced to the new Mikael Blomkvist who is no longer inspired to write after his magazine was sold to a millennial.
Lisbeth hacks into the NSA where a computer specialist played by Lakeith Stanfield is alerted about the breach and fails to stop it. Once the job is complete, she's chilling in a bathtub but a bad dream wakes her. She suspects something is wrong in her studio, and she stumbles into men with masks stealing her computer. She runs into her safe room, and what ensues is a great action sequence that leads to a police chase on her motorcycles. Claire reveals she didn't do any motorcycle riding, and credits her stunt double for some great riding.
After a watered down Lisbeth in the David Fincher movie, it's good to see a much grittier Lisbeth Salander. Grittier didn't mean exploiting her sexuality, says Claire during the Q&A Tuesday. There are no sex scenes in THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB, thankfully for the British actress who cringes at the very thought of having to do a sex scene.
"It just wasn't included because it didn't serve the character. There's no purpose to it. The last thing anyone would want to do is put up a random, titillating thing in there if it doesn't serve the purpose of the story," says Claire.
Fede agreed he didn't want to exploit her sexuality but more so as the news of Harvey Weinstein's abuse of power broke while they were prepping for the production.
"You're a male, white man. Don't forget. I had to make sure I'm not doing it for the wrong reasons," says the director. "Every moment I was thinking about, "is it too sexy?'"
For the scene in the bathtub, the director wanted to capture the nudity in a tasteful manner.
"We had a discussion on how cameras would move so it doesn't feel like we're doing the wrong thing."
Fede says they avoided doing what most movies with female leads do which is dress women in tight, sexy, leather outfits. He's more mindful of that, he admits because of the #MeToo movement, but Claire from the start was looking out for her character in that way.
"Claire was the guardian of making sure we didn't do anything that felt exploitation-y, says the Uruguayan director."
Claire also rejoiced in not having to wear a certain undergarment for the movie. "I refuse to wear a padded bra so that's my victory."
The actress and director made clear THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB has nothing to do with the #MeToo movement and their intent was not to jump on the bandwagon. However, there is one aspect that perhaps some people could relate to.
"She's a survivor of abuse,” says the two-time Emmy-winning actress. “That's how I see her, as a survivor. And if therefore means it represents a certain movement, then that's amazing."
Although she does clarify her female protagonist is nothing like the average leading lady. She's not lovable, pretty, or polite.
"She's not anything a female protagonist is supposed to be, soft... She's hard. She really makes terrible, terrible decisions."
She admits viewers may not get behind some of the actions, but audiences will love this difficult character.
Catch Claire Foy and director Fede Alvarez's very promising THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB in movie theaters November 9.