Thanks to a set wonderful grandparents, Brooke and I took the opportunity to offload the kids for an afternoon so we could go see a movie. We’ve both read the three books in the Hunger Games trilogy (Brooke’s read the first one more than once…), but we didn’t see the first movie in theaters. Of the three books, the second one, Catching Fire, was my favorite because, while it still included “The Games” like the first did, and the associated action set pieces, it also brought the larger conflict of the world into the story with more political dealings. All three books really put their focus on the character of Katniss Everdeen at the expense of showing the reader the rest of what’s going on everywhere else in the world (i.e. they’ll refer to events but won’t show them to you; it’s all second-hand). The second book, and especially the third, start to open that up quite a bit more, yielding a bit more interesting storytelling, in my opinion.
We both thought the first movie did a good job of balancing the content from the source material with the special effects needed to make your money back in theaters nowadays. Thankfully the sequel, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, continues in that vein. I haven’t read the book for a few years, but we both agreed that, while there were definitely a few things left out, most of the key story beats were present, and even the ending was nearly identical to the book.
The story this time out centers on Jennifer Lawrence‘s character, Katniss, and how she has dealt with being one of two Victors of the 74th Hunger Games, held each year between the 12 Districts of Panem (in a future-ish version of the United States where the government collapsed, leaving a reorganization of, well, everything…). Because of the way the previous movie/story ended, the President of Panem, Snow (brilliantly played by Donald Sutherland), seeks revenge upon Everdeen for stirring up conflict between the Districts: conflict that could lead to revolution and his own downfall. He and his cronies devise a special 75th Hunger Games that pits the previous winners from each District against each other yet again, thereby setting up a reason for us to return to the Games for a second movie/story.
The movie’s about 2.5 hrs long, so it does feel like it drags a little bit during the first half. Having read the third book, however, I didn’t mind it because what some folks would see as “filler” is really “foundation” for the third story (and the next two movies…which, as is the trend nowadays, are both drawn from the final book, split in half…). In that vein, there have been a few reviews out there that appear to criticize the movie for being a bit slower than the first one. Again, I feel, this stems from those that haven’t read the books and haven’t seen events in their full context. When we saw the movie, the woman in front of us saw the ending and was genuinely surprised that, apparently, “there’s going to be another one.”
To us, having read the books, we thought it was pretty good. The action was fun, the effects were still as good or better than other major motion pictures pull off, the acting is as good as one would expect (especially from an Academy Award winner…), and it’s still cool to watch a pretty good read play out on the big screen without dramatic changes. It’s pretty important that you see the first movie before this one (well duh…), but if you’ve got the time to read the books, I think you’d get more out of it.