The best film of the year no, century hell the best film of the millennium. this FILM is the victor

Rating: 10/10 (23 April 2012)

This film had great press coverage, and it sounded like my sort of film. I wanted to read the books, but I decided it would be worth it to watch the film first. I LOVED the film. It is not the next harry potter/ lord of the ring/ twilight. It is BETTER than all of them put together. The film starts brilliantly. After a rebellion, the world has been split into 13 districts (this confused me during the film though, it seemed to swap between 13 and 12 districts. As a point of explanation, the barely mentioned district 13 was destroyed before the events of the film.) district one are the rich people, people who live in luxury, whereas district 12 are poor, a third world country, to put it simply. Each year, a boy and a girl from each district are forced to compete in "the hunger games", basically a fight to the death in an arena that the government controls, until there is a victor, the one survivor. The whole thing is turned into a massive event and TV show. The Main character, katniss, 16 years old, is from district 12, what a surprise. Guess who gets picked to take part in the hunger games? The main characters 12 year old sister, who wouldn't last 5 minutes in the games. So, in a heart-breaking scene, katniss volunteers to take her sisters place. Now bear in mind I NEVER get emotional at films if I haven't read the books first (or is about animals) I was almost in tears at this point, 10 minutes into the film. And I was amazed, at the emotion I already felt for these characters. Then is the juicy part, in the weeks running up to the "games", the tributes train, katniss training together with her fellow district 12 tribute, peeta. And these 2 have a past, as he once saved her from starvation and it turns out he is in love with her or seems to be. Throughout the film, it does seem uncertain whether peeta loves katniss, or if is an act. During the games, the tributes can get help from sponsors on the outside, weapons, food or medicine. And during the weeks running up to the games, the tributes are watched, given scores, and the tributes do interviews, and katniss gets the persona of katniss the girl on fire. It is a great set up to the games Now I don't want to go into the games themselves, too many spoilers involved, but I can tell you that it is an emotional roller-coaster that will have you on the edge of your seat from the second they get into the arena, if not from the start. Just suffice to say that katniss suffers injury, loss of friends, betrayal, traps, danger, a fearsome alliance, a trained warrior determined to kill her, and the people in charge of the games who do NOT want her to win and are prepared to play dirty. I will say that there are 2 AMAZING scenes that are still with me, above the rest. There is a part where a friend dies, which is done beautifully, and the climax is epic remember, there can only be one victor... Also, I have now read the books. Usually, my advice is that if you have read the book, don't expect the film. To be fair, there isn't much new, and all the new parts are covered, at least in part in catching fire. I have to say that for once, the books and film are almost equal. I mean, a film can never match a book, but this is the closest it has gotten, with it being VERY similar to the books, with just enough improvements to make up for the bad changes (be fair, readers, how on earth can the hounds be any good on screen with the whole eyes part, I love that part of the books, but it would never have worked and most of the removed parts are for the best, other than that they got rid of the avox. They also downplayed gale, for now.) I would HIGHLY suggest watching it. If you do, all I have to say is happy hunger games and my the odds be ever in your favor