The Hunger Games - A pleasant surprise indeed

Rating: 10/10 (27 March 2012)

Coming into this movie I had no expectations, just that I knew it was based off of a book so I gained the basic plot from my fellow movie-goer friends who had read it. Honestly I didn't expect it to be that good, the plot sounded like a messed up plot with little redeeming qualities and not one that I would condone.
I was taken aback at the excellence in which this movie was filmed. It took a plot that was based off of a book, which quite a few of the viewers like myself hadn't read, and that usually means it would be confusing and not very enjoyable. What I saw was a very well put-together movie that made sense while making me rethink my original expectations. The plot, while not being totally original, was different from almost all other movies in the last few years that I've seen. So what if it drew some plot points from Battle Royale, or Running Man, or Gladiator. My point is, it was based on a book that was inspired by history, not by Hollywood. Collins based it off of Ancient Rome, among other things, so anybody who's comparing this to Battle Royale (and there's a lot of you) is just not getting it.
First, the acting was brilliant. Usually in any big movie there is always an actor or actress that cannot pull off their part or just plain annoys me. Not so in THG, what I saw was young and old actresses/actors alike performing with class and skill, even the minor characters. Jennifer Lawrence was insanely good, it seemed that her roll was based off of her rather than the other way around. Every line line that she said(what few there really were), every emotion that she displayed, every scene she was in, she played them all perfectly and stood out to me as being light-years better than the sub-par acting I've seen in the last few years. She captured all the emotions one would expect from a 16-year-old who was thrust into the kind of scenarios she had to go through, and she didn't even have to say a line to let the audience know what she was thinking, which was quite incredible. I was very pleasantly surprised. The supporting actors as well were just great, from Woody Harrelson, who can pull off a gruff but ultimately kind-hearted drunkard, to Josh Hutcherson, who played the innocent yet strong unexpected love interest. Even the Capitol citizens that ran the games were acted brilliantly, the most pleasant surprise to me was Lenny Kravitz, who pulled off a very calming stylist brilliantly. Overall, one of the best acting performances I've seen, at least in the last 5 years.
Second, the camera shooting. I read tons of reviews that were giving sub-par ratings based off of the jerky camera shots and fast switching angles. Now considering the original target audience would not be able to see an R-rated movie without parental guidance, the studio needed to lower the rating a bit, and they solved this by using the unsteady camera shots. I thought they were used to their fullest, and while some might want to see over-the-top violence, I think the movie did the best it could given it's target audience to show how dreadful the violence was without showing what could have been shown. Jerking the camera around gave a sense of urgency and complete chaos at the right times, which fit the scenes quite well. I accepted the camera shooting as a necessary part of the movie and I admire the work that they put into the filming to make sure the point of the movie was not lost while keeping it target-audience clean.
Third, the world-view of the movie came as a shock to me. Usually movie makers will not put a lot of politics in a YA movie, so I expected the bad guys to be watered down. It was barbaric the way that the characters were treated, it would be really hard to say that this movie glorified violence. If anything this movie portrayed violence as being, well, barbaric and disgusting, but necessary to show for the audience to learn from it. It's definitely a thinking movie, I started lots of great discussions from it, and it has a lot of good lessons to learn.
My favorite part about it, though, was the fact that Katniss was a true heroine, who was not perfect, as there really aren't any perfect people around, but rather was morally sound. She loved her family, if she didn't then she would have never placed herself in her younger sister's place, and that's a rarity in modern films, good family values are hard to come by nowadays. She had unwavering determination to not let the people in charge tell her what to do, to not let them change her to do their will, but to stand firm in her beliefs and buck the system, which she effectively does. Overall, she struck me as the anti-Bella, she's strong, self-sufficient, determined, unwavering, caring, smart, and pretty much everything a good role-model is.
Now, the movie is not perfect, I will admit that it could have been more logical in some places, making it longer might have helped. And this is all coming from me without me reading the book. After watching the movie I went out and purchased the trilogy and read the book, then went again to watch the movie, to see if it was still as good. I think the book makes the movie even better, just like the movie also makes the book better. It's amazing how they work together and augment each other to make the story that much better. I would definitely recommend reading the book, it's an amazing book, but also watch the movie as it's so good I was amazed at how it grasped me.