The Most Beautiful Fraud: The Hunger Games

[ludickid]

Goodness knows who I am disappointing in this matter, but The Hunger Games is probably the best blockbuster film I’ve seen in years.

Which isn’t, unfortunately, to say it’s a great movie.  It suffers from a lot of the same problems all blockbusters do, and as is the case with all of us, it can’t escape its raisin’, but we’ll get to that.  (The

Comments

[happinesstogo]

I wish we could talk about this in person. I read all the books a while back when my coworker loaned them to me and the first one was my favorite. As you might expect, there is more going on in the book than could be conveyed in the movie. The book was scarier and more compelling (then I thought the series went downhill in books two and three). I did not love the books but I thought they were entertaining and somewhat thought-provoking

[theweaselking]

a small group from a wealthy district that trains in anticipation of being selected

Clarification: They actually train with the anticipation of VOLUNTEERING. You never get a 13yo or clumsy kid who needs glasses from the first two districts, because there is ALWAYS a pair of 18yos who've been training for this their whole life who volunteer for it.

Back home in Katniss' district, of course, they can't afford to train, so nobody volunteers, and so it's a true random choice. That's why her volunteering is such a shock.

Oh, and: You never get a fat kid because even in the rich districts getting fat is hard, and if you did, someone else would volunteer. In the poor districts, you're too close to starvation to get fat.

[theweaselking]

Also: The goofy forest fire serves two purposes: To explain why just running away and hiding until the others starve or die in accidents isn't a working plan, and to demonstrate that the gameskeepers can and do intervene, potentially fatally, to make the games more entertaining. It's still GOOFY, but I thought a better-done version would have been fine.

The scene in the rioting district: In the book, nothing is seen at all except from Katniss' perspective. The movie shows more, but a bunch of the fallout (like the riot) mainly matter for book/movie 2.

The giant super-dogs: Yeah, that was kind of better in the book. But as a payoff of the Goofy Forest Fire setup, which is to say "the gameskeepers have decided to end the games by forcing everyone together, and we know they can and do do this kind of thing for the lulz", it was an okay idea.