Dark but good

Rating: 8/10 (21 November 2014)

Having been shockingly rescued from the Hunger Games at the end of film 2, Katniss finds herself pressed into service as the Mockingjay, the figurehead of the growing rebellion against President Snow's repressive dictatorship. But Snow still holds Peeta prisoner, and Peeta is doing the same PR job for Snow as Katniss is for the Rebellion. Meanwhile, Snow continues to order genocidal military strikes as he deems necessary.
The final book in the trilogy is divided in two, as seems to be the current fashion, and this is the first part. Despite only having a 12A certificate in the UK, it is much stronger in content than the previous two films, and it ends with a truly shocking and disturbing image (not that the scenes of the war crimes sites aren't fairly disturbing). There is relatively little action, but what there is is very well staged.
This film is much, much darker than the first two episodes, which leaned quite strongly towards adventure. Part 3 is grittier and more political, and shows how lucky the producers were to get Jennifer Lawrence before other roles catapulted her up the ladder: she, like Katniss, is a Girl On Fire in this. Donald Sutherland is - if it were possible - even more reptilian than he was in part 2. And Philip Seymour Hoffman's small amount of time in this, his last film, shows how good he was.
A good part 3, and I am now looking forward to the final part.