Not so much in the first book. it builds with each book. 50% of the current fans are totally going to hate the third movie.

But 150% will love the second. Oh man, it's great stuff.

I thought the production looked cheap at times and the games wasn't anything special in terms of action and emotion like the hype seemed to suggest. The final battle was pretty ordinary and the rest didn't feel as intense as they should have been. That said, it still managed to be consistently entertaining unlike a couple of HP films which is quite an achievement for this film.

B

Yeah the movie was quite entertaining.

You think about the only entertaining Hp films for general audience were DH2 and GOF...


Anyways pretty solid film. I expected a lot more fighting however I sort of realized this was some crazy stuff. No film is going to glorify kids killing each other. So the fights were short and violent.

Anyways the film focused on the love story and it does lack an epic ending.

However I will remind this is a film made on a 1/3 of the budget of big action summer films.


A-

honestly, im really puzzled by the love for this. Its not bad but like...its just alright. Lawrence aside, theres nothing I can see that can be described as above "good" for this.

I agree with this. The final battle felt almost anti-climatic when compared with the mutts chasing scene or Katniss escaping from the burning forest. I also felt that the side plots weren't fully developed and lessened my enjoyment of the movie. I was entertained and interested throughout but I was never fully engaged with the film due to side plots never being fleshed out more than the surface or through implied meaning so more emotional moments had little effect on me.

The shaky cam movement was also stupid. I hated it that half the time I couldn't tell who was hitting who. For a big movie like this, I don't think it was necessary to give it a more first person feel. Although I can understand why they did it, it totally detracted from my experience of someone going to the games for the first time.

It's not all bad though. Jennifer Lawrence was kick ass as Katniss and I really loved the look and feel of the Games. Social and cultural issues were brilliantly highlighted and tackled as well. Most of the rest of the cast did a pretty good job and the editing was very good.

I feel that if they had added on another 30 minutes and discussed more about the side plots then it would have made for a more satisfying film.

B- (7/10)

I'd rather have a sci-fi movie have some excellent social commentary and mediocre special effects and action scenes (and again I don't think they were intended to be spectacle in the traditional sense) than vice versa.

I think many were surprised that it was not another twilight style film.

In comparison the Hunger games is just soo much better and frankly in terms of mega hits the only quality film to really appeal to a wide audience since last summer was MI4.

I would too. Too bad Hunger Games didnt have excellent social commentary. Sure, there were flashes but it barley scratches the surface on any deep issues.

The "social commentary" of The Hunger Games has been done better in SO many other novels and films.

Brazil and Children of Men being the prime examples, IMO.

Yeah but no one really expected the THG to be the best film ever.


Compared to the big blockbuster recently, it was a pretty solid film.

Lol maybe because I watched this on a Sunday. For some reason I give pretty generous grades to films I watch on Sunday.

It's a "serious" film, though. It has major actors in the cast. It has a veteran director and a healthy budget. So it doesn't deserve much of a curve, IMO. It should be considered right alongside a film such as Children of Men, and it falls very short.

Children of Men was a very harsh and depressing film.

THG is a serious film but its about young people, violence and love after all...

I agree it could be better, but perhaps many in the general audiences were expecting it to be like Twilight all over again and it wasnt.

Indeed. Twilight is loads better.

yeah no.

Oh no you didn't go there.

Well I think many in the audience expected to be another teen fueled hype machine like Twilight, when they heard all the buzz and praise, they got interested. Add in the marketing that really hyped the film...

I think the film did well in drawing people in but not making people think "this is the best film ever!!, like so many mega blockbusters do".

Dude Brazil and Children of Men are all-time classics. The magnus opus of two truly visionary directors. Seriously, top twenty material both and there's such a broad spectrum between those two and much shittier dystopian sci-fi movies.

What makes The Hunger Games social commentary good is largely its relevance. Whether you hate big centralized government, grotesque wealth inequality, shallow and hypocritical media, seeing the bourgeoisie totally disconnected from reality, or the way we've put a digital barrier between us and the violence we inflict upon the world, The Hunger Games touches upon the issue in both clear and subtle ways.

The other thing that elevated this film is that it did stick to its convictions. District 9 may have had sharper social commentary in the first fifteen minutes, but by the end it's completely sold itself out to become a big cheesy bloodbath. At least The Hunger Games owns up to the inherent awfulness of the violence its characters are forced to go through.

but the last half of the film really touches on none of the themes. It's just a survival story, and not that thrilling of one.

And when it does touch on the themes in the beginning, it just touches the surface. There's no deep dive into any of it. Now, perhaps if I had read the books, I would feel more of what is truly going on in this universe. But without any knowledge of the books, the film seems to fail a bit.

Na but I still think that class plays into the second half too. I'm just going to straight up quote Devin Faraci for this one:

The political stuff really pops on second viewing. Again, it's understated. Peeta and Katniss have no idea there's a salve that heals wounds so quickly, but it's apparently readily available to people in the Capitol. The stark contrast between haves and have nots is presented but not commented upon. And that stuff isn't science fiction; I'm writing this on a remarkable flat screened iMac while children in Africa don't even have clean water to drink. Our world is exactly as fucked up as Panem.

It really isn't that hard to connect how Effie talks down to these kids who are on death row about manners and how Geraldo lectures the ghost of Trayvon Martin about how his hoodie is half the reason he was shot dead.

Not to mention tracker jackers are terrifying plausible as they've already created genetically modified mosquitos...

as g said, the cream comes more off as quick solution to progress the plot rather than a look at how fucked up society is.

oh, and David Faraci is never a good person to quote on anything.

I'd argue the fact that these kids are chosen by lottery to kill each other shows how fucked up the society is on a basic fundamental level, and the voyeurism of the audience (yes, you too) throughout plays into how these characters act. After all, they emphasize throughout that it's the opinion of the sponsors that can determine if they live or die.

I won't disagree that this could have been more fluidly integrated into the story, just as the psychotic behavior of the District 1 kids who have been raised to kill might have been shown with a bit more nuance than "I'm so fucking nuts I'm just gonna monologue about how excited I am to kill you." At the same time, she probably Monologued to give the audience a show. And of course, when Katniss actually humanizes Rue she breaks the input-only stream of the games, which unleashes an Arab Spring-style riot that feels very much of the Internet age. It's a cool moment because it shows the contrast between the inherent dehumanization that comes with being projected on a screen and the Internet optimism that this technology can allow people from disparate societies to connect behind a common revolution. Again, it's not as well shot as Children of Men are as lavish as Brazil but the ideas are there, and they do connect to the narrative in a very real way. President Snowe (and by the way the acting in this movie from the supporting cast was great. Donald Sutherland is excllent at purring menace) explains to the game master how Hope is as necessary a commodity to the public as apathy but it must be controlled and contained. There's obvious implications about how Brand Obama used Hope as a slogan, only to then have to work within the confines of the fucked up system Panem clearly represents. They couldn't let Katniss and Peeta die because when the society sees there being no hope (or no social safety net) to balance the lack of freedom, they have nothing to lose by rebelling.

the ideas are there; the execution isnt I think.

You mean it's not that great of a film stylistically? Because I won't argue with you there, the CGI is noticable and the shaky cam is distracting when it's not motivated but I do think the film intentionally understates some of the sci-fi ideas while also making some really blatant, and overall conveys a lot without being overly expository.

If you are talking about the execution of the ideas being lacking, well I guess like A Dangerous Method I just prefer a bit more subtlety. You can really find critiques in our present day system on every end of the political, class, and even gender spectrum. Of course the audience thinks Katniss should have some contrived romance with Peeta. Her subjugating herself to this scenario could be a large reason she wins the games. I much prefer the ambiguity of their relationship to a perfectly executed (that is to say emotionally manipulative) Epic Romance.