A downgrade from the first film.

Rating: 6/10 (9 February 2014)

A dystopian future run by a magalomaniacal dictator who makes young people fight to the death in gladiatorial like contests.
That's a great idea for a film and it is the reason why I loved The Hunger Games (2012). I went into this one with really high expectations.
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire started really well. Darker than the first film and displaying more government oppression as well as the seeds of a revolution, it is certainly an interesting concept. The build-up to the games is done well and the stakes are upped in a simple but brilliant way: past winners are made to fight each other.
Unfortunately, the film starts falling apart when the games start. There are three main problems with the film:
1) Most of the contestants are never properly introduced so it is hard to care for them when they start to die.
2) In a gladiatorial film, the audience wants to see contestants fighting and killing each other. Here, the contestants don't really fight each other, rendering the gladiatorial aspect of the film meaningless. Instead, the contestants spend most of their time battling the weather and other natural calamities.
3) The ending was abrupt, lame and left me feeling cold. It was more of a ruse to get people to the next film than a satisfying ending to this one.
Overall, The Hunger Games series has some really good ideas but in this outing, the film went pear-shaped halfway through.
Special mention goes to Philip Seymour Hoffman who lights up the screen whenever he appears and to Jennifer Lawrence who is still wonderful as Katniss Everdeen but the film doesn't gel and has too many flaws.
I give it a 6/10.