Movies: I'm Hungry

Since Valve and Riot refuse to make any updates for their respective games, I've had to be more creative on what to entertain you kids about, so I thought of something I did a couple months ago, when I saw Sherlock Homes: A Game of Shadows back when it had just come out, so I thought back, and realized I saw The Hunger Games about a week ago, so I figured, why not put up my thoughts on that?

I know that this movie has been really quite popular, just another case of how Hollywood likes to cash in on poor, defenseless movies, and turn them into juggernauts, and put enough hype onto it that everyone, including people who didn't read the book, will want to come see it. Now, I'm not saying that it isn't a good strategy; Hollywood loves to make exorbitant amounts of money on books that are somewhat popular, look at what Brad Pitt's doing to World War-Z. Horrible. A love story with zombies in it? Come on, I don't know whether or not to be more disappointed that Max Brooks would allow it to happen, or that people will go see it. I will, just for the principle of reviewing, don't judge me.

So I don't spoil the story for the 15% of you out there who haven't seen it yet, here’s a synopsis:

"Based in a post-apocalyptic United States, now known as Panem, the Hunger Games follows Katniss Everdeen, who volunteers her district (district 12 out of the total of 13. District 13 however, was destroyed, after resisting the might of the Capital) after her sister gets chosen to be a tribute, to save her. As a tribute, she must go up against 2 kids from every other district in a bloody battle to the death, nationally televised, in a sadistic way of saying "We still have lost of power over you" by the Capital."

Now, for everyone else who is a man and saw it, hit the page break for our continued, interesting discussion on characters.

 
The movie, although not quite as book accurate as I would like it to be, does as good as it can with its 2 hour adaption, leaves out what I feel made the book good to begin with: characters you can love. Cinna in the book was this omnipotent dress maker who doesn't afraid of anything, Katniss has a dead father, and makes sure that nobody forgets it, Peeta baked bread, and apparently through 10 ton boulders while working at his bakery, Katniss's mother had a severe mental breakdown, and didn't care anymore for her children. It was a riot.

But, I got to give them this: it pretty much followed the events of the actual hunger Games quite well. Everything happened. I got the Tracker-Jackers falling on some little girls head, cute little Rue showed up (even if they did show a Riot, which I suppose is meant to be a tie-in for the following movies that are sure, we all know how much Hollywood loves to milk a cash cow clean) and they did do their best to show the importance of Katniss + Peeta showing off the Capital by nearly committing suicide, it was all there, folks.

So, in the end, I give the Hunger Games a respectable 8.5, it didn’t live up to the book, but with their budget, and time restraints, I think they did a good job. Superb acting and only a few minor tweaks to main parts of the story gives it a feel that it isn’t quite complete, but you got the gist of it. If you liked the book, see the movie, if you want to watch kids go nuts and kill eachoter, see the movie, if you’d rather not spend $8.00 for a ticket and another $15 on snacks to see a somewhat incomplete movie, stay home.

--Santa