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Rating: 3/10 (25 July 2014)

Twilight found a teen female audience. The Hunger Games found a teen female audience. They also sold a shed-load of books.
Now its the turn of Divergent but this film fails. Like The Hunger Games this is a future dystopian society but this one has ever running trains that never stop at train stations. It certainly gives the phrase 'a running jump' new meaning. Even a bit of Ender's Game is thrown in here.
In a Chicago which is now a massively walled city after a devastating war, society is divided into five factions: Abnegation the selfless, Amity the peaceful, Candor the honest, Dauntless the brave, and Erudite the intelligent. However there is sixth group that are the faction- less who are outside society and regarded as outcasts. No one seem to questions the role of these outsiders who are left destitute.
Members join a faction based on their choice but are given a suggestion by an aptitude test. Beatrice Prior (Shailene Woodley) has grown up in Abnegation, the faction that runs the government, yet has always been fascinated by Dauntless. Her father serves on the ruling council along with the head of Abnegation, Marcus Eaton (Ray Stevenson).
Each year when kids turn 16 they go through a serum based aptitude test that indicates the faction into which they would best fit. Beatrice test shows attributes of several factions meaning she is Divergent. She is told to keep this a secret as Divergents can think independently and the government therefore cannot control them. During her choosing ceremony she becomes a Dauntless.
So like The Hunger Games we are told that the ruling government has magically found peace after a devastating war and everyone in society is happy apart from the faction-less. We see people happily working the land, some helping each other and the protectors running and climbing things. It certainly looks like Prozac Nation.
Beatrice suddenly joins other Dauntless teenagers running and jumping in and out of trains and soon becomes a super soldier. Yet she does not realise that her training superiors are less comrade in arms and are actually horrid and mean, changing the rulebook. People who fail various stages of training become faction-less and this does not ring any alarm bells that society is not what its cracked up to be.
However there is plot afoot for Erudite leader (Kate Winslet, unrecognisable in a blonde wig) to get rid of other Divergents and take over the government by getting rid of Eaton.
Apart from a silly plot that is full of holes, the acting is rather weak, the characters have no charisma and the film is dull, looks cheap, overlong which makes it drag even more.
Twilight had a romantic sub plot that sucked viewers in as well as dealing with issues of teens in a new town. The Hunger Games had Jennifer Lawrence, a genuine star in the making as well as the survival concept. This film has very little to offer apart from mixed messages. You soon forget which group is who and of course any viewer will realise that humans simply cannot be compartmentalised so easily as they do in this film, we all have certain mixed attributes. Therefore we are all faction-less.