The Hunger Games: Catching Fire *** (2013, Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth) – Movie Review

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire is more or less just a rerun of the first one in the series, 2012’s The Hunger Games, with a cliffhanging ending. The story is almost exactly the same as the first one, and the film’s faithful to the book, so all the many fans of the original movie and Suzanne Collins’s novels will be thrilled. It’s bound to do mega business again.

But the title is a bit ironic. The long, 146-minute movie moves along eventfully and episodically, but it only really catches fire when the action finally starts around half way, with the first half an unfocused slow burn.

There’s a new director and writers. Gary Ross is replaced in favour of popular music video director Francis Lawrence as director (he made Constantine and I Am Legend, both excellent). But there’s nothing he can do to put an individual stamp on this movie. It looks and plays just like the original. It seems like a committee job, with studio decisions and no personal inspiration.

And there are new writers in Simon Beaufoy (The Full Monty, Oblivion) and Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3, Oblivion). It’s their job to get as much of the book up there on screen, as smoothly and convincingly as possible. And that’s just what they’ve done as faithfully as they can, with mostly decent dialogue too.

I guess nobody that loves the books is going to go home disappointed. The producers have spent a $140million fortune to get it all up there on screen and most of that money pays off visually, despite a few weak CGI shots that look really fake (those lightning shots need tweaking). Much of what’s up on celluloid, though, does look rich and exciting.

Our heroine Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) weirdly can’t seem to make up her mind between weedy, whiny Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) and her supposed true love and hunky best friend Gale Hawthorne (Liam Hemsworth). This love triangle recalls the one in Twilight, as I suppose it’s meant to, just like the film recalls the 2000 Japanese cult movie Battle Royale, which, as film buffs were recalling coming out of the cinema, has a similar idea.

As you may remember, Katniss and Peeta happily both survived the 74th Hunger Games by a suicide-pact trick that infuriated its organisers. But they must now leave their family and friends for a stage-managed Victor’s Tour of the districts, during which they sense a rebellion is brewing.

Unfortunately, neither the love triangle nor the unrest in the districts proves very exciting or gripping drama. However, momentum picks up when it’s announced there will be another round of the games. With the Capitol still totally in control and in the picture, but with Gale wounded and out of the picture, Katniss and Peeta are picked for the 75th Hunger Games along with all previous winners, thus including adults this time.

And so Katniss and Peeta’s battle for survival against the Capitol and the machinations of its evil ruler President Snow (Donald Sutherland) starts up all over again. But, remember, we’re half way through the movie at this point. Haymitch Abernathy (Woody Harrelson) says: ‘I think these games are gonna be different’, but hopes of that are quickly dashed when things turn out to be pretty much the same. Killer monkeys attack and a killer fog attacks too. It’s just like an old Hammer Horror film!

Katniss is ultra-tough and keeps having to save the girly Peeta. A fit-looking Jennifer Lawrence does it all very well, and she’s convincingly tough, with a great way with her bow and arrow that might make Legolas jealous. But this is a glum, gloomy, dour role, and Jennifer Lawrence is stuck playing it grimly on the one note she’s offered.

But at least that’s a good note. Poor Josh Hutcherson  is stuck playing his passive, girly role on the one note he’s offered, and he ends up just looking surly all the time. No wonder Katniss prefers Gale! Nobody likes a surly boy. Infuriatingly though, once again Hemsworth is out of the movie most of the time. When are they going to give him something actually to do?

But English actor Sam Claflin is a useful addition to the cast as Finnick Odair, in a very stylish, dashing performance. And so is Jenna Malone, who’s very feisty as the spiky tribute Johanna. I’m not sure about Philip Seymour Hoffman’s rather languid and low-key brooding Plutarch Heavensbee. But it might work out OK later. By the way, is it just me or are these characters’ names truly silly?

Sutherland, Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks (as Effie Trinket) and Stanley Tucci as the camp TV Games host Caesar Flickerman try their darndest to liven things up with amusingly eccentric, fussy performances. And they succeed to quite an extent. They really do their best with this material, and without them the film would be greatly impoverished. It’s rough acting, but it kind of hits the mark. And you kind of look forward to seeing them all again next year. Lawrence and Hutcherson too, if only they’d cheer up a little.

3D next time maybe?

Catching Fire became the top grossing film of 2013 in North America. The first film to head the annual box office with a first-billed female lead since Ellen Burstyn in The Exorcist (1973), it is also the first with a woman as the sole protagonist and primary marketing focus since Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music (1965). Congratulations, Jennifer Lawrence!

Director Francis Lawrence is currently in 2013 filming the sequels The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 for release in 2014 and 2015.

Tragically, Philip Seymour Hoffman died on February 2 2014, aged 46, from an apparent drug overdose  in his New York City apartment. He was currently filming The Hunger Games: Mockingjay.

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© Derek Winnert 2013 Movie Review

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