New DVDs: ‘The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo’

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Sony, $30.99; Blu-ray, $40.99

Director David Fincher and screenwriter Steven Zaillian adapt Stieg Larsson’s bestseller “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” into a sophisticated and gripping thriller, sporting excellent lead performances by Daniel Craig as a disgraced reporter and Rooney Mara as a punk hacker. Larsson’s story of a gruesome missing-person’s case is gratuitously violent at times, and the film runs a little too long — in large part because it goes through about four endings before finally lurching to a stop. But the sense of place and character is unusually vivid for a bloody mystery movie, and the director of “Seven” and “Zodiac” knows a thing or two about how to make a crime picture feel substantive. Fincher provides a commentary track to the DVD and Blu-ray, which also contain more than four hours of behind-the-scenes featurettes.

Carnage

Sony, $30.99; Blu-ray, $35.99

Based on Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning play “God of Carnage,” the Roman Polanski-directed domestic drama “Carnage” stars Jodie Foster and John C. Reilly as sensitive Brooklyn parents whose son gets beaten up on the playground by the son of an uptight couple played by Christoph Waltz and Kate Winslet. Over the course of 80 taut minutes, the four adults talk it out — starting out civilly and then turning more savage. All of this probably made for a riveting evening of theater, but on screen all four of the principles come off as overexcited and out of sync with one another, in a plot that’s gimmicky and predictable. There are flashes of brilliance, but the movie as a whole never coheres. Special features are limited.

The Muppets

Walt Disney, $29.99; Blu-ray, $39.99/$49.99

“The Muppets” brings back Jim Henson’s beloved creations in a colorful, funny movie full of catchy songs and a positive “be yourself” message. Most of the 100-minute running time, though, is eaten up by a plot that sees Jason Segel and Amy Adams playing young couple Gary and Mary, who come to Los Angeles with Gary’s Muppet brother Walter and get involved with trying to save Muppet Theater. The story is cute and sweet, but marginalizes the real stars. Fans can get more Muppet goodness from the DVD and Blu-ray, which feature deleted scenes and tongue-in-cheek, behind-the-scenes material, plus a commentary track.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Focus, $29.98; Blu-ray, $34.98

It took more than six hours for the BBC to cover all the twists and turns in John le Carré’s espionage novel “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy,” so director Tomas Alfredson’s two-hour adaptation naturally misses a lot of the book’s nuance. But even viewers who are befuddled by the movie’s super-speedy run-through of the story — about retired secret agent George Smiley’s attempt to root out a mole — should appreciate Gary Oldman’s controlled, Oscar-nominated turn as Smiley, especially given that he’s playing off such superb actors as Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Toby Jones. The novel is less about chases and shootouts than about rumpled men sizing up each other, and that comes across in the movie as well. The DVD and Blu-ray come with an Alfredson-Oldman commentary, plus deleted scenes and interviews.

And…

Battle Royale: The Complete Collection

Starz/Anchor Bay, $44.98; Blu-ray, $49.99

Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life

Music Box, $34.95; Blu-ray, $43.95

Hop

Universal, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.98

The Sitter

20th Century Fox, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.99