{"id":3013,"date":"2012-03-26T13:38:31","date_gmt":"2012-03-26T20:38:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hotnerdgirl.wordpress.com\/?p=3013"},"modified":"2024-02-28T09:31:14","modified_gmt":"2024-02-28T09:31:14","slug":"hungry-for-some-hunger-games-movie-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/2012\/03\/26\/hungry-for-some-hunger-games-movie-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"Hungry for some Hunger Games (movie edition)"},"content":{"rendered":"
Chelsea and I definitely agreed it was worth a Sci-Five!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ok seriously, I don\u2019t know wtf was up with the audience in my theatre but I couldn\u2019t tell if I was there to watch a movie or at a meeting of the World\u2019s Smallest Bladder Club.\u00a0 I think the four people in our group were the only people in the entire theatre that didn\u2019t get up to pee at some point. \u00a0And don\u2019t even get me started on the couple who brought the newborn baby.<\/p>\n

Aaaaaand my bitch session has officially ended, on to the review of Hunger Games<\/em>!<\/p>\n

*The usual warning: I actually do a pretty good job of not spoiling things but if you’re nervous about it, you may want to wait until after you’ve seen the movie to read my review.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Oh, Katniss Everdeen.\u00a0 I love you so much.\u00a0 We have a lot in common, you and I. We are both tougher than we look, don\u2019t make friends easily but are fiercely loyal when we do, would do anything for our younger siblings, and are totally clueless when someone has a crush on us.\u00a0 That is, until they flat out say it\u2026and maybe clap their hands in front of your face and set off a foghorn in your ear.<\/p>\n

Oh, Jennifer Lawrence.\u00a0 I love you so much.\u00a0 You\u2019re the actress I would have picked to play Katniss and I\u2019m very happy that the powers that be agreed with me.\u00a0 You bring strength and vulnerability to a role that could easily have been botched by lesser actresses.\u00a0 Plus your perty.<\/p>\n

Oh, Peeta Mellark.\u00a0 You\u2019re such a sweetheart.\u00a0 You represent all the guys who are in love with the girls who say \u201cyou\u2019re just like my brother!\u201d\u00a0 You\u2019re quietly supportive and then completely awestruck when the girl finally starts to see you in a different light.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been that girl who has dated that boy and I root for you.<\/p>\n

Oh, Josh Hutcherson.\u00a0 I feel like I\u2019ve watched you grow up.\u00a0 You were pretty good in Bridge to Terabithia<\/em> and even better in The Kids Are All Right.<\/em>\u00a0 You\u2019ve turned into quite the charmer.\u00a0 Your smile is totally adorkable.\u00a0 I heard about you introducing Liam to White Castle, then playing basketball so hard you both threw up all those hamburgers.\u00a0 That\u2019s really gross but really funny.\u00a0 Male bonding is weird.<\/p>\n

Oh, Gale Hawthorne.\u00a0 You\u2019re the guy that the girls who don\u2019t realize how awesome they are feel like they can never get.\u00a0 You\u2019re a stud but you don\u2019t even know it.\u00a0 You\u2019re a great friend and you think of that dorky girl as a cute little sister until the day someone else starts to pursue her and then you realize that you\u2019ve loved her all along. I\u2019ve been that girl who has dated that guy too and I root for you as well.<\/p>\n

Oh, Liam Hemsworth.\u00a0 You\u2019re dating Miley Cyrus and I\u2019m not gonna lie, that kind of turns me off.\u00a0 BUT, you\u2019re Thor\u2019s little brother and you seem really down to earth in all your interviews so I\u2019m willing to look past the Miley Factor.\u00a0 You\u2019re also kind of ridiculously cute.\u00a0 Not as cute as your older brother, but you can hold your own.<\/p>\n

Other District 12 peeps:<\/p>\n

You might recognize Mrs. Everdeen if you watched the Battlestar Galactica<\/em> prequel Caprica <\/em>where <\/em>Paula Malcolmson played Amanda Graystone. I think she was a good choice to play the mom-with-no-first-name.\u00a0 She\u2019s excellent at staring blankly and crying. \u00a0Primrose Everdeen is a character I totally love and I think that Willow Shields did a fine job portraying her. \u00a0She’s got some heavy stuff coming up in the next two films and I hope she’s up to the task. \u00a0Woody Harrelson was an inspired choice to play Haymitch, the only Victor that District 12 has ever had.\u00a0 He provided comic relief but also some very tender moments that I found very endearing.\u00a0 He came to SFSU when I was a Freshman to talk about SOL (Simple Organic Living) and legalizing marijuana and while Miss Mary Jane is not my thing, I really enjoyed watching him speak.\u00a0 He struck me as the kind of guy I\u2019d like to chill out and have a beer with (or, in my case, a shot of Jager).<\/p>\n

Capital peeps:<\/p>\n

Lenny Kravitz was lovely as Cinna, Katniss\u2019s stylist and Capital BFF.\u00a0 In real life Jennifer Lawrence and his daughter Zoe are best friends (they starred in X-Men: First Class<\/em> together) so they already had a relationship that could be expanded upon.\u00a0 I\u2019ve really grown to like Elizabeth Banks.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t pay too much attention to her early in her career.\u00a0 I thought she was cute as Betty Brant in Spider-Man<\/em> but that was about it.\u00a0 Then one day something clicked and I\u2019ve been keeping an eye on her ever since.\u00a0 She made for a great Effie Trinket, though I always imagined Effie being even perkier than Banks\u2019 portrayal.\u00a0 Seneca Crane is a pretty minor character in the books.\u00a0 They definitely expanded his role for the movie to take full advantage of Wes Bentley and his epic swirly beard.\u00a0 I love Donald Sutherland.\u00a0 When I was a kid a TV movie came out called The Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All<\/em> and I don\u2019t know why (probably because I\u2019m a huge history nerd), but that movie has always stuck with me.\u00a0 It stars Sutherland as an aging Confederate Captain who takes Diane Lane as a child bride.\u00a0 In it he has a cold, calm demeanor with a vicious temper lying just below the surface. Much like President Snow.\u00a0 President Coriolanus Snow is scary because of all the ways he isn\u2019t scary.\u00a0 He\u2019s small with slightly snake-like features, he zealously tends his gardens, and he doesn\u2019t raise his voice.\u00a0 Quiet and calculating, the man literally has blood breath that he masks with the genetically engineered super roses he wears on his lapel. \u00a0But the Capitalist of the Year Award has to go to Stanley Tucci as Caesar Flickerman.\u00a0 Brilliant.<\/p>\n

I wrote a post after reading The Hunger Games<\/em> for the first time in June 2011.\u00a0 Normally I would reread the book before going to see the movie but I\u2019m right in the middle of A Dance with Dragons<\/em> and I didn\u2019t want to interrupt so I\u2019m purely going off memory here. \u00a0From what I remember the movie follows the book extremely well.\u00a0 A great film adaptation that I can\u2019t help but feel is owed to Suzanne Collins\u00a0helping to write the screenplay.\u00a0 Two things that were different and that I really missed were:<\/p>\n

1. The omission of Madge Undersee, the Mayor\u2019s daughter who gives Katniss the Mockingjay pin in the book.\u00a0 The ties that bind them are eventually revealed in Book 2,\u00a0Catching Fire<\/em> and take the story to an even deeper, more emotional level.<\/p>\n

2. The dogs at the end of the Hunger Games.\u00a0 In the movie they are pitbull-type and identical but in the book they are mutts with the mutated faces of the kids who have already died in the Games.\u00a0 The mutt dogs are meant to be a total mindfuck for the remaining Tributes, as opposed to just being giant scary dogs.<\/p>\n

Respect yo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I think that the\u00a0filmmakers\u00a0are relying on the fact that you\u2019ve read the book and already know about some of the characters and situations.\u00a0 Having read the books and not finding it a problem, I know this only because one of the people I was with hadn\u2019t read the books and was very confused by certain parts, like the three-fingered salute.\u00a0 He wanted to know where the heck that came from and what it meant.\u00a0 I\u2019m hoping the DVD has deleted scenes like the dubbing of the redhead as \u201cFoxface\u201d so that I know they at least tried to get it in there but just had to cut it for time.\u00a0 Also, I cried twice within the first 50 pages of the book and probably a dozen times over the course of all three.\u00a0 There is a true sense of hopelessness and despair that just can\u2019t be captured onscreen.\u00a0 I got a little verklempt during Rue\u2019s final scene but it didn\u2019t deliver the emotional wallop I was expecting it to and that kind of bummed me out.<\/p>\n

Stylistically I thought that the movie was gorgeous.\u00a0 District 12 was appropriately bleak and made the surrounding woods that Katniss and Gale escape to all the more beautiful.\u00a0 The Capital was gaudy, though not as much as I expected it to be.\u00a0 I was expecting to see people with green skin and implanted cat whiskers and whatnot but found that I didn\u2019t really miss them.\u00a0 The flame effect was nicely done.\u00a0 For some reason I always pictured their whole bodies being on fire, as opposed to just the head and shoulders.\u00a0 But that didn\u2019t really bother me.<\/p>\n

I really liked the Hunger Games Control Room with its sterile interior and white uniforms.\u00a0 It kind of made me feel like zombies were going to break out of a holding cell down the hall.\u00a0 But that\u2019s a good thing (for once) because it means that it was creepy and the idea of people sitting around and calmly deciding how best to kill innocent children is a really creepy idea.<\/p>\n

If I have one complaint it\u2019s the shaky cam.\u00a0 I seriously hate shaky cam.\u00a0 I saw the movie twice, once closer to the screen and once further back.\u00a0 Being further back I didn\u2019t notice the shakiness that much and I enjoyed the movie much more.\u00a0 When I was closer to the screen it gave me a bad headache a la Cloverfield\u00a0<\/em>(a movie that I will never watch again despite my love for JJ Abrams and Lizzy Caplan).\u00a0 So if the filmmakers ever read this (haha yeah right) I implore you, please ditch the shaky cam unless you deem it absolutely necessary for very small parts of the film.<\/p>\n

Most of all, this movie got me really, really, REALLY excited for the next two films,\u00a0Catching Fire<\/em> and Mockingjay<\/em>.\u00a0 I can\u2019t wait to see how they handle the Quarter Quell and District 13, etc etc. \u00a0Gah! I\u2019m trying really hard not to give anything away for anyone who hasn\u2019t read the books yet.\u00a0 If you haven\u2019t, you really should.\u00a0 They are technically YA novels but that\u2019s kind of like saying the last few Harry Potter<\/em> books are for children.\u00a0 They\u2019re really not.<\/p>\n

4.5 out of 5 Sci-Fives!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ok seriously, I don\u2019t know wtf was up with the audience in my theatre but I couldn\u2019t tell if I was there to watch a movie or at a meeting of the World\u2019s Smallest Bladder Club.\u00a0 I think the four people in our group were the only people in the entire theatre that didn\u2019t get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[28,11],"tags":[145,148,166,194,257,267,288,292,339,349,380,413,448,449,497,520,534,579,582,605,660,672,674,730,732,757,761,815,841,882,925,1023,1049,1069,1084,1091],"class_list":["post-3013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","category-reviews","tag-caesar-flickerman","tag-capital","tag-catching-fire","tag-cinna","tag-district-12","tag-donald-sutherland","tag-effie-trinket","tag-elizabeth-banks","tag-foxface","tag-gale-hawthore","tag-girl-on-fire","tag-haymitch","tag-hunger-games","tag-hunger-games-control-room","tag-jennifer-lawrence","tag-josh-hutcherson","tag-katniss-everdeen","tag-lenny-kravitz","tag-liam-hemsworth","tag-madge-undersee","tag-mockingjay","tag-mrs-everdeen","tag-mutts","tag-paula-malcomson","tag-peeta-mallark","tag-president-coriolanus-snow","tag-primrose-everdeen","tag-rue","tag-seneca-crane","tag-stanley-tucci","tag-suzanne-collins","tag-tributes","tag-victors","tag-wes-bentley","tag-willow-shields","tag-woody-harrelson"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3013\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hotnerdgirl.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}