The Hunger Games - Part 3a

The last film I watched in 2014 was the film that was meant to be the final Hunger Games film, but because of wanting to make more money artistic reasons the producers of the franchise have decided to split it into two.  This seems to be a part of life these days.  In the future will we see the middle parts of franchises also split into two films?  If they can split The Hobbit (a 200 page book written for children) into 3 films then surely anything is possible?

Hunger Games Mockingjay - Part 1 is the proper title of this film, one that starts the end of the story of Panem and Katniss Everdeen - played once more with no end of gusto by Jennifer Lawrence.  It is pleasing to see the Oscar-winning Lawrence carry on in her role in this franchise, I can imagine other actors with snobbier opinions of themselves leaving such material behind now that they've graduated into the A-list.  This is clearly a film with a lot of pull for top actors though, with Julianne Moore joining a cast that already contains Lawrence, Woody Harrelson, Donald Sutherland and Philip Seymour Hoffman.  Reading's very own Natalie Dormer even turns up too, sporting an American accent and keeping her top on for once!

This third instalment moves the action permanently away from the actual Hunger Games, loses much of the science fiction from the first part and replaces it with a propaganda war between two factions in Panem's growing civil war.  On one side are the elites in the capital, led by Sutherland's President Snow, on the other are the insurgents of District 13, led by President Coin (Moore).  Each wants to use its own 'victor' of the games to lead a propaganda war to win over the other districts.  Katniss is wheeled out by District 13 as the heroine who stood up to the system and represents freedom - aka the Mockingjay.  The story largely revolves around their attempts to build her up as a heroine of the people and how she reacts to being put on such a pedestal.

I don't want to have to say this, but I didn't think too much of this film.  It was interesting enough because it advanced a story that I found captivating over the previous two instalments, but it felt like it was mechanically checking off the plot points rather than building a narrative.  The tone of the film didn't feel right either.  There is a slightly silly scene in which Katniss can't act, and although it does wonders to showcase Jennifer Lawrence's acting talent, it does little to make the war feel real.  When the action does ramp up and Katniss finally gets into the field and gives an impassioned speech about fighting the capital to the end, the script kills its own momentum by sending her off for a semi-romantic stroll in the woods with Gale.  I can only imagine that this is what happens in the book, and so the script-writers felt compelled to include it, but it doesn't really fit.

I have not read the original books, but I am told that nothing is being left out now, and sequences that were short paragraphs in the book are now being dragged out into elongated segments.  There is a rescue sequence that goes on for a good 20 minutes, in the book this is merely mentioned to have happened outside of the main narrative.  A screenplay should be a different thing to a novel, film and print are very different forms of storytelling and you can't just import one into the other.  It's this sort of milking of a story that can kill a franchise or turn off the casual viewer - not good.

As I've said before, this will all come down to the way it ends.  Everything so far has pointed towards Katniss making the ultimate sacrifice to save Panem.  She sacrifices herself to save her sister in the original reaping.  She is prepared to sacrifice her life rather than kill Peeta at the end of the first games.  She is the 'girl on fire'.  Joan of Arc might be a saint in France, but things didn't end well for Joan herself - look it up.  Despite all this though, I am eagerly looking forwards to part 4.