The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1★★★★1/2
The Mockingjay lives
Katniss in District 13
Peeta's [REDACTED]
Having twice survived the Hunger Games, Katniss finds herself in District 13. Under the leadership of President Coin and the advice of her trusted friends, Katniss reluctantly becomes the symbol of a mass rebellion against the Capitol and fights to save Peeta and a nation moved by her courage.
WARNING: Possible spoilers ahead.
The third book in the Hunger Games series is a divisive one—seems like most people I know either hate it or love it. I fall in the latter camp. I mean, the ending's not really a happy one, but it's a realistic one. And after all that Katniss went through during the series, I'm not surprised one bit that she ends up more than a little broken, and dealing with heaps of PTSD. I'm typically on the side of preferring the happy ending, particularly for characters I've come to know and love, but in this case I think the realistic ending works better. /bookrant
I am not a fan of the trend in Hollywood to divide the last book in a series into two films. It makes more sense to me to do it the other way; dividing the first book into two might give more time for world and character building. But Hollywood doesn't listen to me, and so we end up with movies like The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1 that use way too much punctuation in their titles that seem unnecessary. Thankfully, unlike some other split adaptations (*cough*The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn—Parts 1 & 2*cough*), I thought the powers that be did a good job at splitting Mockingjay. For those of you who haven't read the books, or don't want to be spoiled about where the split happens, jump down to where I start back up with the black text. For the rest of you: It happened after they got Peeta back from the Capital and he rages out on Katniss. It's very shocking, and very well done.
The cast in this series continues to be awesome—yes, even wooden Liam as Gale—and "newcomers" Natalie Dormer as Cressida (that hair!), Julianne Moore as President Coin, Mahershala Ali as Boggs, and Elden Hensen and Wes Chatham as Pollux and Caster, respectively, make excellent additions to the group. It was also interesting to see District 13, and learn more about the rebellion from their perspective, but man, the shots of District 12 were pretty hard to stomach.
There wasn't a whole lot of action in this film, but, if you've read the books, you know what's coming in the next one. I'm both looking forward to it and a little sad that the series is coming to an end. No other YA adaptation has even come close to doing as good of a job at bringing the books to the big screen as this one. (And before you go saying, "but wait!"—Harry Potter is middle grade. ;))
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I still wish this was just a super long movie with an intermission. I think since "we" (those who have read the books) knew what was coming, it kinda took the UMPH out of it. Granted, I still cried like a baby! LOL
ReplyDeleteI actually opted to not see this in theatres, and just wait to see the final installment in theatres. I am really not a fan of the splitting up of final books, and I think you're a genius for the suggestion of splitting up the first! Brilliant.
ReplyDeleteI loved the third book as well, especially the ending. I am a bit odd, and usually prefer a realistic or even tragic ending instead of a happy one! But overall, I really liked this whole series, and I agree that the movies have done a magnificent job (compared to most) of bringing the books to the screen.
The last movie is really where the actions going to be. This one was just a lot of setting up of the revolution, I feel. Having just plowed right into it with a bunch of new characters (which I think they'd have to do if it was only one movie) wouldn't have worked well for anyone who's never read the books. That said, the whole splitting up of books still bothers me.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm glad to know that I'm not alone in my like of Mockingjay! :)
Very good point. I would have watched a four-plus-hour long Mockingjay for sure.
ReplyDeleteI think it worked for those who haven't read the books, though. It set up the revolution a bit, and the Peeta reveal was shocking. My hubs turned to me when it happened and was like, "That's not Peeta ... WAIT, that's Peeta?!" I'm sure that's the reaction the studio was going for.