'Girl With the Dragon Tattoo' Debuts in Japan to Limited Censoring

TOKYO – Director David Fincher and star Rooney Mara made the trip to Tokyo for the Japan premiere of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo on Monday, after a weekend when it emerged that the film won't be released in India due to a censorship row.    

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The pre-screening show featured a Japanese artist painting a dragon on a huge canvass onstage, joined midway through by seven dancers dressed as the female lead, performing on the runway set up down the middle of the theater.

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Fincher and Rooney entered from opposite sides of the cavernous Tokyo International Forum to walk the red carpet up to the stage, where Fincher joked that he had chosen to film the “Millennium Series” trilogy of Stieg Larsson novels, “Because it was a best-seller.”
 
“I want to make a long, witty speech, but I made such a long film that I'll have to keep this short,” said Fincher.
 
“It was a real joy to look so different and lose myself in the role,” Mara added. “I fell in love with the character after reading the three books.”
 
Before the Oscar-nominated film began, the newly completed dragon painting was lit from behind in a series of vivid colors that appeared to animate the creature.
 
The screening went ahead with the lesbian, rape and torture scenes that offended Indian censors, though there was some mosaic-blurring of the kind that graces even pornographic films in Japan.
 
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo gets a nationwide release in Japan on Feb. 10.
 
Twitter @GavinJBlair