The Girl who Played with Fire, the sequel in the movie trilogy adapted from Stieg Larsson’s books, is something of a petering out, the blackened tip of a sparkler already spent.

The first film, “The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo,” seems to have reached the peak the rest of this trilogy should have done.
Nothing important happens in this sequel directed by Daniel Alfredson.

To say there is no plot is not the same kind of positive characteristic as in a movie like “2001: Space Odyssey” or Bronson.

If you look at character development in this movie that has something to do with Mikael and Lisbeth chasing people around, you’ll find nothing.

In fact, there’s nothing in “Played with Fire” that couldn’t have been summed up in five movie minutes, nothing that happens to necessitate a movie.

This could have been a compelling mood piece, a thriller with atmosphere perhaps.

But director Alfredson is incapable of creating tension or suspense.

He shows too much (Lisbeth seeing her apartment “intruder”) or ignores opportunities for suspense by just moving the camera around without juxtaposing a shot against a shot of a hand lifting a gun and so on.

“Played with Fire” should be nominated for worst movie of the year.

It shows so little of Lisbeth and Mikael, its two protagonists and wastes time on idiot thugs and side characters that we care nothing about.

It ends much like Tom Tykwer’s “Heaven” with a slow-motion POV shot from a character looking around.

Unfortunately, nothing important has happened to justify looking around.

And the helicopter ascension is obnoxious.