2 hours of packaging, 30 minutes of substance, and then some weaknesses

Rating: 4/10 (2 January 2015)

Somewhere around 45 minutes into this film I noticed I was rather bored. Hardly anything was happening. By the time the movie was over, not much more had happened. I liked the first two installments of the "Hunger Games" series, so what was the problem here? The problem is very simple. This is a movie that never should have been. The substance should have been condensed into the 30 minutes that it deserves and then used as the opening half hour of the final installment that will be released later this year. If you like the "Hunger Games" series, you will have to watch this one just so you know the (few) plot developments and meet the new characters. That, I presume, is precisely what the producers wanted: a way to extract more admission ticket money from the audience. Too bad. In doing that, they have reduced the overall value of the series.
It's also strange that the production team did not do more with the 2 hours they had. (Slight spoiler follows.) For example, we get endless scenes of Katniss being horrified, shocked, upset, emotionally stressed, outraged, angry, sad, etc., etc. Then near the end we get a mad dash to finish, with the raid on the capital given short shrift and making the file look amateurish. A small bunch of commandos go into the capital but then are let go in so obvious a way that they know they have been let go. Yet everyone is too dumb to try to figure out why the nearly-omnipotent and omniscient President Snow and his baddies let this bunch go. Shades of Star Wars IV. There are other similar kinds of weaknesses in the plot or its development, where something that could have been interesting or useful was ignored for the sake of showing more scenes of Katniss in emotional pain.
(Another slight spoiler.) Speaking of the omnipotent/omniscient Snow, that's another irritating aspect of the film. Snow has hidden cameras and spies everywhere and miraculously knows nearly everything going on. Why hasn't he blown the rebel base to smithereens before now? Why does he wait until this movie to do it? Makes no sense. Why does he not send in ground troops to ensure destruction of the rebel base after he has bombed it? Makes no sense. The right way to do would have been for Snow not know where the base was or even that it existed - but then there would have been no excuse for the uninteresting bombing scene with its fake drama of the barely-rescued younger sister and her cat.
There's another low-budget element that irks me in a high-budget undertaking such as this. How does the capital city manage to survive while it is bombing into oblivion all the productive cities in its periphery? Where does it get its minerals, silicon chips, food, fuel, plastics, planes, cars, guns, asphalt, cement, cloth, machinery, nail clippers, scissors, kitchen utensils, spices, books, ink, paper, toys, diapers, diaper pins, etc., etc. Does it make them all itself? Do you know any city on Earth that comes even remotely close to being able to do that? Of course not. Shades of the potentially good but ultimately trite film Divergent.
Given the high quality of the first two installments in the "Hunger Games" series, we had good reason to expect another good show this time. Unfortunately, we didn't get it. The acting is good, and the plot does advance a little, so overall I give the film four stars.