With director David Fincher‘s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo set to open in a few days, earlier today I attended a press conference in New York City with Fincher, Rooney Mara, and Daniel Craig. In the coming days I’ll have a transcript (with audio), but I wanted to post a bit of news from the interview today.

Even though the first film has yet to open, with the popularity of Stieg Larson’s Millennium trilogy, it’s almost certain Dragon Tattoo will be a big hit for Sony and they’ll likely move ahead with the sequels as fast as they can. Since the second and third books (The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest) are one story, Fincher was asked if he might shoot the sequels back to back. Continued after the jump.

Here’s what Fincher was asked:

Given the compression of the last two books, if you direct the whole series would you consider shooting them at the same time? David Fincher: Yes, the second two books are very much one story and it doesn’t seem prudent to me to go to Sweden for a year. Come back for a year. Put out the second one. Go to Sweden for a year. Come back for a year. I don’t think Rooney wants to be doing this four years from now. So I think that would be crazy especially given the sense that it’s really one story that’s kind of bifurcated in the middle.

While I often think shooting two movies at the same time is a bit too much for most filmmakers, if anyone can make it work it’s David Fincher.

However, before anyone thinks they’ll be making the sequels early next year, I also got to speak with screenwriter Steve Zaillian this morning and he told me that he hasn’t yet started writing the second screenplay. But he did say he’s heard rumblings the sequels might shoot back to back and he’s confident he could get both screenplays ready in time.

Zaillian told me that it takes him around six months to get a first draft ready so I’d imagine the sequels to Dragon Tattoo wouldn’t be in front of cameras until late 2012. That would mean the earliest Sony could release The Girl Who Played With Fire would be this time in 2013. But this is just an educated guess.

With The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo opening in three days, I’m sure in the next few weeks we’ll hear an official announcement about the sequels.

Look for the full interviews very soon.