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The Hunger Games


stawns

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I don't know if they were aiming for this but in the movie

it seemed like they were using the love story as a reason to keep Katniss alive.

I didn't see any indication of a love triangle whatsoever.

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I am assuming you havent read the books yet?

In the book, Katniss and Haymitch use the star crossed lovers thing to win over sponsors, but she does eventually fall for Peeta...whether she is aware of it or not. It was pretty much, the more lovey dovey she was willing to get with Peeta in the cave, the better the gifts from Haymight and sponsors were. Obviously it was hard to get into Katnissès (sorry my apostrophe button is busted...) head in order to make it super clear that she is selling the love story to the viewers, so it might not have been totall obvious in the movie. It was never really stated in the book that Seneca Crane wanted Katniss to win. One thing that they left out that disappointed me were the Wolf Mutts at the end. They were supposed to be very human like and each one was supposed to resemble a fallen tribute. I dont think there was any reason for them to not at least have more werewolf-ish time of creatures in the movie.

Also, the love triangle is coming...hopefully they wont play it up too much...it was already my least favourite part of the books.

To stay super true to the book, I think the book may have had to be made into a rated R movie...but that would mean excluding the target audience.... so we will just have to live with the lack of action. Hopefully the rest of the movies in the series will be a little more...well..graphic. Or maybe they can release a directors cut on DVD where none of it is left out (I saw the UK version which supposedly had parts editted out so they could get a 12A rating...)

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In terms of books and my opinion.

The Hunger Games > Twilight

Harry Potter > The Hunger Games + Twilight

Percy Jackson > Harry Potter + The Hunger Games + Twilight

Mocking Jay was bad. Ctaching fire was ok. The movie was one the best ive watched in 2012

Twilight just simply sucks. Didnt even get through the first book, nevermind the movies.

Harry Potter was enjoyable. Though, freaking long to watch.

Percy Jackson is the best. Though the movie was terrible

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In terms of books and my opinion.

The Hunger Games > Twilight

Harry Potter > The Hunger Games + Twilight

Percy Jackson > Harry Potter + The Hunger Games + Twilight

Mocking Jay was bad. Ctaching fire was ok. The movie was one the best ive watched in 2012

Twilight just simply sucks. Didnt even get through the first book, nevermind the movies.

Harry Potter was enjoyable. Though, freaking long to watch.

Percy Jackson is the best. Though the movie was terrible

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The movie was good for a book adaption. Sort of felt like a Disney'd Battle Royale to me. If you liked the basis of teenagers being forced to kill each other by the government in a competition of sorts and fine with some actual blood and violence I would recommend watching or reading Battle Royale, a japanese novel/movie which is very similar to The Hunger Games.

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As far as the film goes, the comparisons to the horrendous teenybop movie Twilight are laughable, if there's any "love" that isn't a ploy for putting on a show for the sake of survival, it's Katniss for her sister. To me this is simply a nice sci-fi drama/dystopia film.

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http://www.npr.org/2012/03/22/148941034/acting-trumps-action-in-a-games-without-horror

Suzanne Collins' novel The Hunger Games and its two sequels are smashingly well written and morally problematic. They're set in the future, in which a country — presumably the former United States — is divided into 12 fenced-off districts many miles apart.

Each year, to remind people of its limitless power, a totalitarian government holds a lottery, selecting two children per district to participate in a killing ritual — the Hunger Games of the title — that will be televised to the masses, complete with opening ceremonies and beauty-pageant-style interviews.

Out of 24 participants, only one child will live. And we hope it will be Katniss Everdeen, from the impoverished mining District 12 — a teen who, when her little sister is picked in the lottery, volunteers to take her place.

Why is it problematic? Kids killing kids is the most wrenching thing we can imagine, and rooting for the deaths of Katniss' opponents can't help but implicate us. But the novel is written by a humanist: When a child dies, we breathe a sigh of relief that Katniss has one less adversary, but we never go, "Yes!" — we feel only revulsion for this evil ritual.

If the film's director, Gary Ross, has any qualms about kids killing kids, he keeps them to himself. The murders on screen are fast and largely pain-free — you can hardly see who's killing who. So despite the high body count, the rating is PG-13.

Think about it: You make killing vivid and upsetting and get an R. You take the sting out of it, and kids are allowed into the theater. The ratings board has it backward.

The packed preview audience clearly loved The Hunger Games, but I saw one missed opportunity after another. Director Ross has a penchant for showbiz satire, pleasant in Pleasantville but ruinous in Seabiscuit — a great book about the torturous underbelly of horse racing turned into a lame, movie-ish period piece.

He approaches The Hunger Games like a hack. The film is all shaky close-ups, so you rarely have a chance to take in the space, and the editing is so fast you can't focus. As Katniss' dissolute mentor Haymitch, a former Hunger Games champ, Woody Harrelson has no chance to establish a comic rhythm — or disgust at what he's doing. The book's most fascinating and mercurial character, the costume designer Cinna, is now a blandly nice guy played by the agreeable but dull non-actor Lenny Kravitz.

A highlight of the book is how Cinna uses his showbiz savvy to make the reluctant Katniss a star, the center of the pre-Hunger Games pageant. But in the movie, her entrance in a costume that's literally in flames is so poorly framed that you can't revel in her triumph. Ross throws away what could be a startling image of child warriors rising out of tubes to face one another in a semicircle, knowing they might die in seconds. Where is the horror?

The film gets some things right, like the shots of Katniss running through the woods, the canopy of trees above her streaking by. And it has an astoundingly good Katniss in Jennifer Lawrence. She's not a chiseled Hollywood ingénue or a trained action star — she looks real. And without words, she makes it clear that Katniss' task is not merely to stay alive but somehow to hold onto her humanity.

A few other actors register in spite of the speed-freak editing. Josh Hutcherson has a strong, sorrowful countenance as Katniss' fellow District 12 contestant, Peeta. Stanley Tucci in a blue bouffant as a talk-show host, Wes Bentley in a manicured black-fungus beard as the games' high-tech coordinator, and Donald Sutherland in a white mane as the demonic lion of a president are all you could hope for.

There's a terrific score by James Newton Howard that captures moods — wistful, mysterious — that the director fails to evoke. The Hunger Games leaves you content — but not, as with the novel, devastated by the senseless carnage. It is, I'm sorry to say, the work of moral cowards.

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http://www.npr.org/2...-without-horror

This review makes a good point. Why are the MPAA able to lower the rating of a movie about children killing children, just because they remove the "sting" and gloss over the obvious issues this subject brings up. Clearly its done just to reach a wider audience and earn some more box office money, maybe it shouldn't be allowed?

They should've forced them to make it Rated R and hopefully force the director to think about at least broaching the subject to the audience. It's for this reason that, sadly you realize why this will just be another "hollywood blockbuster" movie nobody remembered and not a potential classic like the original, Battle Royale, became.

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