Movie Review #6 The Hunger Games (2012)

-Another book series brought to life by talkies.

I'll start off with the fact that I have not read any of the books in this series. I know the title, and I have the feeling that people are latching onto the book series to a fashion not unlike Harry Potter or the Twilight series (the only thing the three series have in common is that they could be broadly categorized as fantasy) and that was what I had going into the movie.

Pretty quickly I found out it had similar aspects to movies that I enjoyed like Battle Royale and The Running Man. This is not so much a good or bad thing, just an observation, not every single movie needs to have an earth-shattering never seen before story that blows you away. The three movies mentioned prior all have different reasons for being completely different characters within the similar premises and budgets that are almost not comparable. The Hunger Games contains a lot of flash and bang for its buck. There are quite a few instances of CGI in a movie that I thought (due to not reading the books) was going to be a little more grounded.

That's not to say that I was disappointed with the movie, (don't fret! fans of the book or movie) or that this review is a mad full-on hate of the movie, but it has it flaws and I'll explain one of them through my experiences as a movie go-er. During a supposed emotional scene the woman next to me was bawling her eyes out, not merely a sniffle but more of a death of a dearly loved one kind of tears. I sat there during the scene surprised she could be so connected to the characters while I sat there asking “Who is that? Was I suppose to care?” I found out the character's name about 20 minutes later and only because the crying woman next to me made me take note that perhaps this was an important character. This sums up a majority of my problem with the movie The Hunger Games: there lacks any serious amount of emotional portrayal from just about every single character, save two sequences that had they been the weakest emotional scenes, I could understand the woman's crying.

The movie clocks in at 2 hours and 22 minutes and honestly I really wanted more background information about the world. The science of the world seemed rather interesting but you're just left to agree that yeah, that just happened, next scene! They explain the fire suits but we're just left to question how they made dire dogs. Medicine and general computer antics are just thrown at you at about half way and most of it just comes as a surprise to the viewer.

On the flip side, I thought most of the acting was done well enough; Jennifer Lawrence was a gem in the movie, but it's no surprise for me as I've adored her since I saw her in 2010's Winter Bone. Stanley Tucci also gave a notable performance due mostly to the fact he was a mix of Ruby Rhod from Fifth Element and Castor from Tron: Legacy. He was the only one that seemed to really live the crazy post-apocalyptic world and not seem down right goofy for goofy sake. Though that might be more a dart at the books/script than the acting to be truthful.

And the award for most awkward  pageant goes to...

Honestly I think the movie was really entertaining as the clock was never watched. I do, however, think a majority of the emotional attachments to characters were ripped out from the book and so only the readers of the books may find any particular scene emotionally grabbing. The movie comes off as a better companion to the book serious, than a proper stand alone article.

The Hunger Games received 7/10

PS: I went through the first hour of the movie thinking they were saying Cadmus not Katniss.