So much Potential, so many possibilities, shrank down to an average film.

Rating: 6/10 (15 January 2013)

First of all, i never read the books, I wanted to let you know that before I continue.
The beginning was very good, it set up the situation of the characters and the status of society. Their struggles and their thoughts, it was all very well built. The big city was interesting and full of themes of Artificiality, commercialism, control, fascism etc. it was all very compelling.
But the more time passes the more the movie starts falling apart. You start to feel like this preparation is taking a little too long, And when we reach the Games themselves, it is, underwhelming. It comes a point where even the games themselves seem to drag. And by the time the movie ends, all those emotional queues and situations where, somewhat thrilling cause the characters are very likable, but it's not as strong as the movie intended it to be. Almost everything about this movie's theme or message is just not as strong as it would've been.
As i see this movie i see all the possibilities of strong emotional moments, and a deep message about society and it's current state, morality and the human condition. But the movie completely underplays all of these things. They exist, but they don't use them, they don't take advantage of this and use it to the betterment of the film as a whole. It feels like they took away many character and situations, moments that would've given much needed layers to the film. And i feel it was because they were afraid to challenge it's viewers, afraid to make the audience question themselves or the characters in the movie.
here are the main reasons i believe they ruined this movie.
1. How come nobody says their opinion on this society? there is obviously some disdain towards them but, why not say some criticism or something to give the viewer a thought, an idea on why it's bad. We can think it's bad, but i'm sure they can have something relatively compelling to say about it, even if it's only 1 or 10 words, anything to give the audience something more to think about.
2. Who are these competitors? what are their fears or their aspirations? Why is it so easy for them to kill each other? why are they working together? this movie never takes time to give the other competitors any humanity. I am sure they have families and a loved one or hell, maybe not, but why not show that to us?
I know showing them die might be too R rated, but at least give them some humanity, make these peoples death truly matter. By not giving them a personality, they just become normal villains to the protagonist, making us be happy they killed another human being forced into this just like they have. Don't you think that would give some much needed dramatic strength to the film?
3. WHO IS RUE (Amandla Stemblerg)!!!! there is a very important scene that comes from the death of this girl (not a spoiler cause you know only one survives), and it's very dramatically intense and does something very important for the rest of the film, and hell for the series itself. Yet WHY is she so important? The movie didn't give any time us to know this girl. Why did it create that issue on her home district? these games have been going on for 73 or so years, what makes THIS specific moment important!? This also applies to the lack of development for the competitors i mentioned before, but this is it's own special category because she was meant to be important and yet she was just a very nice girl...and that's it.
4. If you have nothing to show, move to the next person! This movie is concentrated on Katniss the whole time, but this is a big issue when the games start. because, i wouldn't have minded, if she DID anything. By the end of the film, it doesn't feel like she went through a big change in her life, she killed one or 2 people, but it was because of self defense, aside from that she just hides and runs and does some things, but because she doesn't have to go through big issues, why not concentrate on Peeta, or to anybody else competing?
Peeta had a more compelling time there because he had an alliance, he had to help hunt down these other people and he specifically said before it all started that he didn't want to be changed, he didn't want to kill anybody. There is a strong dilemma here and it was ignored to concentrate on Katniss getting hurt, why is this more important?
5. NO RISKS!! this movie ignores everything about the plot. it doesn't take advantage of the drama of the morality involved in murdering each other, it doesn't explore the emotions characters go through, the doubts, the stress. it doesn't pay attention to nobody, everything is taken so artificially, they took away everything that would've made this movie worth watching.
The only really good thing from this is that it made me want to read the book, because i feel like the book is gonna do a much better job at telling a story with a message and true drama better than this film ever will.