Jennifer Lawrence returned to the world of the Hunger Games and brought along another Lawrence (unrelated). The addition of Francis Lawrence to the film team as director is the catalyst for making this film a far brighter film than the first. As someone who generally finds the book to be far superior than the film, I for once had a hard time holding fast to that mentality. While far from perfect, Hunger Games 2.0 takes the character story to the place where I wish they’d gone from the start.
In my mind the Hunger Games is a love triangle built on the backdrop of a revolution story. The series focuses on the world of Panem, a post apocalyptic society composed of 13 districts responsible for the production of various things necessary to the continuation of life, and the Capitol district, the law making district where the aristocracy thrive. In the first book we meet Katniss Everdeen, a teen who volunteers to partake in the murderous hunger games in order to save her sister from having to participate. Now if you haven’t seen the first one, you shouldn’t be reading this. So, stop before I remind you that…
The first film ends with Katniss and Peeta (the other participant from her district) winning the games together. The second film completely evolves the first film by delving into the relationship between Katniss and Peeta as well as Katniss and her first love, Gale. This love triangle is core to the understanding of the character story and while being the source of the first movie, it was largely undervalued visually and in terms of story time by the first movie in exchange for more battle time on screen.
In the second film the screen time is spent developing the character relationships and wowing us with incredible makeup and costuming effects. So much of the story is told through the setting here that it mutes the need to say too much about the rebellion and even hunger games side of the story. What we see tells a world tale. What we hear is a wonderful love story.
Some Thoughts:
- I’ve been meaning to put together some pieces for theMaricopan.com, a growing local blog that is more representative of life in this small city (or large town?) than anything else I’ve encountered so far. Soon, young padawans. Soon…