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The Hunger Games movie sucks bloated goat ***Follow

#27 Mar 30 2012 at 7:57 PM Rating: Good
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You'll note that I don't have a problem for crap movies in the general sense, after all, there is an entire demographic of people who not only bought tickets to Saw I, but then giddily went and bought tickets to Saw II, III, IV, all the way up to Saw XLVIII Jigsaw Dismembers Godzill and Rambo. There is an industry built on people who cheerfully light their money on fire repeatedly.

However, silly non-literary teenagers aside, otherwise respectable critics were raving about this movie as well, which is what suckered me into seeing this film. As a rule, unless someone I know who has like movie tastes like mine encourages me to see a film, I'll ignore what fans say about a flick (s'up, Fandango reviews?) and check out, say, Ebert and Roper for instance. However, Hunger Games madness overtook even those critics whose advice I would normally take.

But this movie was billed as a contender to such films as the ones I mentioned earlier, like Avatar, Godfather, etc, etc. And in no way does this film even come close to the quality of a movie, except for perhaps, American Pie II or Meatballs, the Original. Just sayin'.

As for these tenagers not being skilled in woodsman-like arts, there was the District Whatever guy who was slicing and dicing with a sword like he was a ninja. Is it too much to expect that the traoiner of that young mnan would teach him skills whenin he hunted other humans? If these young people are being groomed for combat, then it would be reasonable to expect that they would be taught to get to the point where poking people with sharp objects came in handy-- such as woodcraft.

Totem
#28 Mar 30 2012 at 8:00 PM Rating: Good
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As for my Twilight review, I say wait unti it comes out on Lifetime. It'll be the back-to-back for Pretty Woman on Christmas Day.

Totem
#29 Mar 30 2012 at 9:24 PM Rating: Excellent
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Totem wrote:
like Avatar, Godfather, etc, etc.


You keep putting these together, and I'm not sure why.
#30 Mar 30 2012 at 9:25 PM Rating: Good
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I think $10 is a small price to pay to find out you're easily manipulated.
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#31 Mar 30 2012 at 9:53 PM Rating: Good
You really put Avatar up there with Godfather?
#32 Mar 30 2012 at 10:47 PM Rating: Decent
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Totem wrote:
Ok, who, here actually thinks this movie was worth more than the bargain $0.99 used DVD bin? After watching this steaming pile of dung I came away with the inescapable conclusion that today's teenagers don't know squat about good movies or plotlines that you can't drive a semi through.

First, the characters are two dimensional at best. Catnip or whatever she calls herself is the healthiest looking starving Appalachian teenager in a future society you could ever imagine. However, beyond a vaunted abilty to "shoot a squirrel through its' eye" her only talent is looking disgruntled. Her mentor, Woody Harrelson isn't much better. As a former Hunger Games winner he offers little help beyond the marginally helpful tip to turn and run at the starting gun of the Games. He gives no clues as to how to win, where to hide, what techniques she should use to slay her opponents, or even what the rules are-- which incidentally, change at a moment's notice.

And this is a major issue: the people running the game arbitrarily change the rules to steer the contestants toward a desired goal, notably out loud to what I would imagine would be the audience's consternation. First it's a single winner only game. Then it changes to a team-can-win format. Then it changes back to a single winner rule.

Next, her fellow District contestant who ostensibly is on her side, but has an opportunity to kill all the kids who have grouped together while they are sleeping, but fails to do so. Several times.

Catnip has a bow but fails to use it's range to subdue her foes. As it turns out, happenstance kills her opponents for her. She was doomed to lose except chance got in the way and offed the other District's kids instead.

She has no sense of tactics. She moves around when she should be hiding, gets treed, makes tone of noise, builds fires, and is largely is asking to get killed. She wears orange stripes, uses no camoflauge, and uses a bright silver bow and arrows.

Finally, in the future everybody looks like Cyndi Lauper. They wear gaudy makeup, weird costumes, and appear to have turned gay en masse.

The movie sucked a$$.

Oh yeah, at the end she threatens to eat poisonous berries and bluffs the gamemasters into making her the victor. Only as the way the game is played it makes no sense why they didn't just let her kill herself-- that was what the president wanted all along, but no, she survives to star in yet another horrible movie.

Did I mention the moviue sucked a$$?

Totem


Ok, so I just came back from the theatre....this...soo soo much this..oh-my-god..
#33 Mar 31 2012 at 12:44 AM Rating: Decent
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I would equate The Godfather and Avatar, not necessarily for commonality, but for what each did to push the boundaries of what filming can do. Godfather showed a storyline and Avatar showed the power of computerized cinematography.

Totem
#34 Mar 31 2012 at 2:25 AM Rating: Good
Totem wrote:
I would equate The Godfather and Avatar, not necessarily for commonality, but for what each did to push the boundaries of what filming can do. Godfather showed a storyline and Avatar showed the power of computerized cinematography.

Totem

Avatar was a gimmick and The Godfather is one of the greats.
#35 Mar 31 2012 at 6:15 AM Rating: Excellent
You disliked an anti-big government flick that also vilifies "hollywood" culture AND the media?

You're coming over to the dark side now!
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#36 Mar 31 2012 at 11:30 AM Rating: Excellent
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Also he loves the one where a guy turns against the military to save a foreign culture and the environment from big business!
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#37 Mar 31 2012 at 1:54 PM Rating: Good
Worst. Title. Ever!
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Jophiel wrote:
Also he loves the one where a guy turns against the military to save a foreign culture and the environment from big business!


I thought Varus made that rant.
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#38 Mar 31 2012 at 2:36 PM Rating: Good
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Harumph. I re fuse to be pigeonholed. And cornholed by the rest of you.

Totem
#39 Mar 31 2012 at 6:30 PM Rating: Excellent
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Totem wrote:
Avatar showed the power of computerized cinematography.

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within did that. Avatar was just some movie 8 years later that marketing convinced people to watch.
#40 Mar 31 2012 at 7:21 PM Rating: Good
Yeah, Avatar was a gorgeous movie, but beyond that it wasn't anything special. And this is coming from someone who has never seen Dances with Wolves. =x I have seen Pocahontas however, so my opinion might still be a bit skewed because of that.
#41 Apr 01 2012 at 7:02 AM Rating: Default
I created an account just to reply to you. I feel you HAVE to know.I assure you beyond a doubt- every single error you listed throughout your posting was caused by the irreparably stupid (lack of a better word) @sses, who ruined a coulda-shoulda-been-a-great-movie. The true flaw was trying to shove such a great length of time into a short film adaption. The first book could have been split into two parts....Please read the book. It truly is fantastic. The pile of garbage you speak of actually inspired me to read it, however if I hadn't, I'd have been under the false assumption the book was as ridiculously terrible. It is not. They butchered what could have been a sensation- Oscar worthy. The orange backpack? She was supposed to camouflage. The Willy nilly rule changing? The audience couldn't understand the reasoning behind it because it wasn't narrated- which this type of movie/book needs and demands. They even created extra scenes that didn't exist! What the hell? The book is so extremely equipped, there was no need. The thing that truly ruined it was its rating. If it were higher, and not aimed at its chosen demographic of tweens, it would have been better. So, in the end, the result was a bunch of kids running around in the woods playing swords. The emotion. The laughter. Anger. Hope. Was all lost in translation. I actually almost cried in the book when rue died, only because, she actually had a developed relationship with katniss. Would the audience have known that? No. Because, they gave her five lines and made it seem like their time together was so short...which it really wasn't. If you want to read a fantastic book, or at least remove the taste of $hit from your mouth- read the book. Please!
#42 Apr 01 2012 at 7:08 AM Rating: Good
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No, thanks.
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#43 Apr 01 2012 at 9:09 AM Rating: Good
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OhhhhNoYouDidnt wrote:
I created an account just to reply to you. I feel you HAVE to know.I assure you beyond a doubt- every single error you listed throughout your posting was caused by the irreparably stupid (lack of a better word) @sses, who ruined a coulda-shoulda-been-a-great-movie. The true flaw was trying to shove such a great length of time into a short film adaption. The first book could have been split into two parts....Please read the book. It truly is fantastic. The pile of garbage you speak of actually inspired me to read it, however if I hadn't, I'd have been under the false assumption the book was as ridiculously terrible. It is not. They butchered what could have been a sensation- Oscar worthy. The orange backpack? She was supposed to camouflage. The Willy nilly rule changing? The audience couldn't understand the reasoning behind it because it wasn't narrated- which this type of movie/book needs and demands. They even created extra scenes that didn't exist! What the hell? The book is so extremely equipped, there was no need. The thing that truly ruined it was its rating. If it were higher, and not aimed at its chosen demographic of tweens, it would have been better. So, in the end, the result was a bunch of kids running around in the woods playing swords. The emotion. The laughter. Anger. Hope. Was all lost in translation. I actually almost cried in the book when rue died, only because, she actually had a developed relationship with katniss. Would the audience have known that? No. Because, they gave her five lines and made it seem like their time together was so short...which it really wasn't. If you want to read a fantastic book, or at least remove the taste of $hit from your mouth- read the book. Please!


You poor thing. The world is a big bad scary place, and Hollywood is one of the biggest monsters, always creating a more broadly palatable story than your beloved fantasy book allows. Obviously, your first experience with the phenomena was one of the first pieces of literature your enjoyed despite people telling you not to. Obviously you should have listened to the naysayers and saved yourself the heartache.
#44 Apr 01 2012 at 12:18 PM Rating: Good
OhhhhNoYouDidnt wrote:
The thing that truly ruined it was its rating. If it were higher, and not aimed at its chosen demographic of tweens, it would have been better.


You know the book's aimed at tweens too, right?
#45 Apr 01 2012 at 1:18 PM Rating: Excellent
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Was there any of this "adults consuming young adults literature en masse" thing going on before Harry Potter? I suppose if you back far enough you had The Hobbit and the Narnia series but I can't think of anything from the 80s or early-mid 90's until Harry Potter. Now it's been Harry Potter into Twilight into Hunger Games. That's only three series but each one has pushed out enough books to form a constant stream of grown-ups reading books nominally written for 10-14 year olds.

Edit: I'm not even saying that it's a terrible thing. Beats a lot of other stuff I guess. It just seems like a new thing.

Edited, Apr 1st 2012 2:19pm by Jophiel
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#46 Apr 01 2012 at 1:42 PM Rating: Good
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There's always been really decent YA series around. They basically have everything except explicit sex. But I guess most adults hadn't discovered them, apart from the ones who read all through their teens. The Dark is Rising series. The Alanah series. The Chrestomanci series. All those amazing books by Alan Garner.

I think there's a problem turning these books into movies, because I have a feeling that books can be dark and violent and young audiences can cope with that more than they can cope with the same thing displayed point blank in visual media like a movie. There's a bit more distancing possible in a book. You can stop reading easier than it is to stop watching. You can stop imaging written words easier than it is to stop taking in images from a movie. Basically a g rated book would make a pg 13+ or 15+ movie, and a pg 13+ or 15+ book would make an 18+ movie.

For instance I read the Narnia series when I was very young. I adored them. But I remember myself at that age, and there's no way I'd cope with the movies at the same age as I read the book. especially the second movie, Prince Caspian. I'd have been scared out of my wits and tried to hide under the cinema seat with my hands over my ears.
#47 Apr 01 2012 at 1:55 PM Rating: Excellent
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Aripyanfar wrote:
There's always been really decent YA series around. They basically have everything except explicit sex. But I guess most adults hadn't discovered them, apart from the ones who read all through their teens

Well, that's just it. I have no idea if the series you mentioned are great or not but none of them because huge best selling phenomenon where it was common enough to have adults reading them on the train, in restaurants or whatever.
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Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
#48 Apr 01 2012 at 3:09 PM Rating: Good
I guess Northern Lights was pretty popular among adults mid nineties, but it was never a thing in the same way Harry Potter or Twilight was. The kind of momentum those fanbases have is mostly a product of the internet, I think.
#49 Apr 01 2012 at 6:20 PM Rating: Good
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Allegory wrote:
Totem wrote:
Avatar showed the power of computerized cinematography.

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within did that. Avatar was just some movie 8 years later that marketing convinced people to watch.
You can't say that FF did that when no one saw it.
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#50 Apr 01 2012 at 6:56 PM Rating: Good
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Aripyanfar wrote:
There's always been really decent YA series around. They basically have everything except explicit sex. But I guess most adults hadn't discovered them, apart from the ones who read all through their teens. The Dark is Rising series. The Alanah series. The Chrestomanci series. All those amazing books by Alan Garner.

I think there's a problem turning these books into movies, because I have a feeling that books can be dark and violent and young audiences can cope with that more than they can cope with the same thing displayed point blank in visual media like a movie. There's a bit more distancing possible in a book. You can stop reading easier than it is to stop watching. You can stop imaging written words easier than it is to stop taking in images from a movie. Basically a g rated book would make a pg 13+ or 15+ movie, and a pg 13+ or 15+ book would make an 18+ movie.

For instance I read the Narnia series when I was very young. I adored them. But I remember myself at that age, and there's no way I'd cope with the movies at the same age as I read the book. especially the second movie, Prince Caspian. I'd have been scared out of my wits and tried to hide under the cinema seat with my hands over my ears.

I read The Hobbit when I was...nine? And Narnia around the same time. As for Alanna (Song of the Lioness cycle), that was during my early teenage years and it made such an impression that I named my firstborn Thom. Unfortunately he didn't have a female twin, or else we definitely would have gone that route.
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#51 Apr 01 2012 at 6:58 PM Rating: Decent
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Oh, and my brother-in-law handed me some discs with writing scrawled on them, so I may get a chance to evaluate the movie without contributing to the Hollywood Machine.
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publiusvarus wrote:
we all know liberals are well adjusted american citizens who only want what's best for society. While conservatives are evil money grubbing scum who only want to sh*t on the little man and rob the world of its resources.
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