The Hunger Games

Haven't read the books, but is it possible the author's publishers rushed her to finish the third book in order to help with landing/promoting the film adaptation of the series?

 

Can't see this being a time related issue. I honestly think she just uses twists to mask a lack of development in her plots.

 

I liked the ending of book 3, but like you said, it was way too abrupt and confusing. The emotions at the end seemed to be the desired target, but the method of getting there was head scratching.

I'm trying not to spoil anything for others, hence the reason for being so cryptic.

 

Dark endings are usually the best way to go when one isn't too sure. Kafka was the master at it, as he had no other good option given the nature of his stories.

 

Collins was involved in writing the screenplay herself. I think she and whoever she collaborated with may have struggled to express some of the main character's opinions and feelings that were found in the book as well as some of the history of the games, etc. I am not sure that it will matter much in the end though.

Some of the changes perplexed me a bit.

 

Really?

I'm quite the opposite, I thought it was a terrible adaptation. There was no story. Only a slide show of events.

Was it ever explained how Katniss feels about Peta, and vice versa? It is a bit key to the story. There was no elaboration of how District 12 was able to produce such a skilled naturalist. As far as everyone who saw the movie may know, everyone can hunt. There was no real elaboration on the various districts, and what their specialties are. This is more important in the second book, so maybe it comes out then.

On the whole, I thought there was no story development, no plot development. Nothing really at all, except that there were some kids, they fought each other. Two of them won.

 

I thought the same, but I am a crazy Harry Potter fan, so I think Rowling is a friggen genius. But Collins is not a good writer. The first book was poorly written, but the story was intriguing. The second book was written better, but fell off towards the end.

I did not like the last book. I thought it lacked direction. The fight in the city and the ending was disjointed, at least to me.

 

My biggest complaint was that the "romance as a strategy" was underplayed. It was played (which is why it was a good adaptation with a couple flaws instead of a terrible adaptation), but it was underplayed. I'm not sure if people who hadn't read the book would catch on.

As far as elaboration on whether all the people in the district can hunt and what the other district specialties are, you're expecting way too much. They were never going to turn it into a four hour movie. I thought they developed the story as a whole pretty well, and took full advantage of the medium whenever possible. For instance, the glimpses into the game design room is something that the book never could've done but gave a lot of insight into what was happening. And, as I said, showing the riot instead of the seaweed bread wonderfully communicated the emotional impact of the Rue scene on the audience in a way that the book couldn't have matched. They left some stuff out, and they left some stuff out that they shouldn't have left out (the absence of sleeping pills being my biggest complaint), but on the whole, they did good work.

 

Underplayed is a bit limited, I think. That is pretty well the entire second and third book. Snow's reaction. The talk with her and Haymich for the Victor's celebration. The interview. It is pretty well the entire thing. They have to pretend, otherwise lots and lots of people will be killed. They have to keep it up, so that it isn't a rebellious shot against Snow and the capital, but a truth.

They attempted it, but it was basically: You have to say you couldn't live without him. "Okay."

I mean, they could have put in little bits of information without dragging the movie out. I mean, was it really necessary for Gale and Katniss to have a discussion on how long it has been since she has seen a deer? No. No elaboration about Peacekeepers controlling the city, but in District 12, them looking the other way. Not even a brief flash into the idea that the warehouse with the old woman was a black market.

How many times did they revisit the scene of Peta throwing out loaves of bread? Three. Was it necessary? Once should of done it, with a bit of dialog.

There was scene with the coal mine explosion that killed her Dad. Any elaboration of that scene? I don't remember any. Just a dream, with no real background. Just a slide show of images.

A full 30 second count down as she entered the tube to go up. Necessary? I think a bit of a pause for apprehension, and then on the platform would have been good enough.

That movie could have been sped up, and parts added. But instead if was a slow, drawn out series of images flashing around with no real direction and no idea of what actually was going on. But its a good thing we had a cut scene talking about Tracker Jackers... Seems like voiceing over the 10 minute sawing scene would have been sufficient...

 

I caught onto the love as a strategy theory early, but I thought it was a little abrupt how they didn't go into detail about how the districts came about and what were the strengths and weaknesses of each of district. Had a buddy that has read the books explain that to me. My biggest negative for the movie was the lack of creatively explaining the ravenous pit bull like monsters. According to friends that have read the book, they are actually meant to mean much more, kind of a reflection of each of the 20 tributes that had already been killed. Instead they just said ok, now we're gonna create absolute beasts and see what happens. It was ridiculous. Especially since they had a giant black kid who could be starting as a D1 linebacker going up against all those little kids left to kill and then suddenly, oh he's dead, we don't have to worry about him. Also I understood that the rioting thing was made up or at least over acted.

 

"I've sold to peacekeepers before"

"Not on the day of the Reaping!"

You're right that they could've cut some of the scenes you're talking about, but they didn't to either build tension or develop character. I don't want to lose that just in order to get every little piece of information from the book into the movie.

I agree on the romance as strategy, although I think you undersell the degree to which they included it. The "you call that a kiss" sent a pretty clear message. They had the "you have to say you can't live without him" afterwards, and the. . . uhh. . . shall we say. . . disagreements between Snow and the Game-Maker, which ran throughout the film and ended with. . . you know how it ended. All of those told part of the story. I think there were a couple places where they could've told a bit more, and my main criticism of the movie is they didn't take a couple easy opportunities to do that. But they had enough of the storyline that people could follow it and that they'll understand it when they see it was the foundation for the 2nd one. Which is better than you get from a lot of book to movie adaptations

 

The strengths and weaknesses of each district are expounded upon MUCH more fully in book two. You didn't have much of an idea in book one except that one and two were careers, three was technology (the district three kid set up the mines), eleven was farming, and twelve was coal.

The dog-monsters were different than in the book, but I can't really see them recreating the book scene without it being extremely cheesy, so I was okay with that. They were ferocious enough to believably kill Thresh and Cato.

The riots were alluded to in the book (possibly not until the second book), but the book also didn't cut back and forth from one group of people to another. It didn't show what was happening in the districts while the fighting was going on, so it couldn't actually show the riots but only recount them later. The movie, just because of the differences between cinema and print, was able to show the riots as they were happening instead of flashbacking later. That was actually my favorite thing about the movie: it took full advantage of the medium

 

but you knew the story behind the dog monsters. Imagine not having a clue about them and then suddenly they introduce one for no good reason. Then ok, let's throw a crap ton of them in there just for fun. Sure it's believable they were ferocious enough to kill Thresh, but without knowing what they were, it just seemed like well how the crap are we gonna kill the big, strong powerful stereotypical black guy? "let's create monsters". Boom, answered, now Katniss can win much easier. That's how it appeared to me, someone who had no idea what was going on before it unfolded.

 

The sort of thing that bothers me is how the dude from District Eleven doesn't win (or come close) every damn year. It's the farming district with a high black population. So pretty much SEC football recruiting ground. I understand that they're untrained compared to districts one and two, but why are they not always strong contenders?

 

A few things I liked better in the movie:

1. I liked the riot scene after Rue dies. It seemed like a nice touch that also shows what's coming.
2. I liked that the creatures at the end weren't supposed to represent anything. I thought the creatures designed as characters was just weird more than anything.
3. In the book, it's clear Katniss and Peeta almost eat the berries as a trick. In the movie, it seems more like defiance. I liked it better that way.
4. In the movie, it shows Haymitch talking to Crane, and you can see where he got the idea for the two winners rule. I don't think the book had something like that.
5. I'm glad they didn't overdo it with the seal and anthem like they do in the book. It would have gotten extremely annoying.

 

Wife said they reminded her of the hell dogs from Ghost Busters. My how far we have come in a couple of decades.

 

Yea, but Katniss sold to peace keepers too. So that whole dialog was kind of odd to me.

I think the intro into the second movie will cover a lot of the missed romance from the first. They won't necessarily have to try and deal with some of the hunting background, they can just include it in with a conversation between her and Gale, that talk about "We had to pretend, and have to pretend now. There are riots, and rebellion, and if we don't, they'll kill us and our families and burn District 12 to the ground." Sort of thing, with Gale getting all happy to want to go rebel as well.

But nobody has any idea how good 12 has it, at least not from the movie. 12 has it good, or at least, as good as they can have it while also starving to death. But at least they don't have that, and peacekeepers.

I guess more of that will come out in the second one as well, when Gale tries to sell to the new peacekeeper, and gets whipped for it. We'll see, though.

I just didn't feel like I got the story, and I feel like a 2.5 hour movie should be able to tell a bit more of a 300 page story than was actually told. Leaving too much of it for the second movie limits the second movie. And unless they are going to try to push this to a four part series, they need to wrap as much of up as they can, because part two is going to require some story telling. Especially to explain some of the crap they do in the arena.

 

Collins is not adapting the second movie. That may be a plus for it. Regardless, some side stories and character building has been passed over as a result of omissions.

Some background details could have been filled in with voice-overs.

Why leave out the scene where Peeta was injured by Cato? That seemed to be an easy inclusion.

Why bother showing the hovercraft when Katniss and Gale were in the woods? That seemed unnecessary, costly, and not particularly useful.

I like Woody Harrelson, but I was never really convinced he was drunk. Why not show Katniss burying the table knife in the wall on the train?

I am sure there are reasons, but I had to listen to my wife complain.

 

I agree on the District 12 comment as well. There was also comparatively little made regarding how few winners were from District 12 and how unlikely having a single winner would be.

In regard to the number of movies, Woody made the comment somewhere that he had signed on for four films. May just be a misquote or a rumor.

 

I forgot about this one, but it was my second major complaint after the underplaying of romance as strategy. He was far too together. I was picturing something closer to Jeff Bridges as Rooster Cogburn