I finally saw the Hunger Games (open spoilers)

Cafe Society
1

I watched the Hunger Games on DVD last night. I haven’t read the book.

I thought the plot, at least the movie plot, suffered from some major plot holes, so I just came here to vent and complain. My kids made me stop complaining during the movie, so I have nowhere else to turn! Feel free to destroy me in this thread.

I guess my biggest problem was that the society was so dystopian, that I had trouble suspending my disbelief. It’s not like they took slaves or captured warriors or criminals, like the Romans did, and pitted them against each other (not that I’m saying that’s OK). Instead, they chose people at random from their own communities. In my view, the way to get society to accept that kind of abuse is to treat the victims as “other”. The society depicted fails to achieve that.

This was meant to be the 74th games or something, but I literally cannot imagine the districts accepting this kind of treatment for so long.

As to the games themselves, there is no way that you could have it winner-take-all that way. The games could not be set up so that you could end up with one person from the district having to kill the other one from that district – there would be generational feuds and riots. It’s not like the districts were that large anyway, at least District 12 was small enough so that everyone could turn out for the lottery, without having to do some sort of broadcast. Sure, they changed the rule for these Games, but that rule would have had to have been in place.

Also, the alliances during the games don’t make any sense. Why would one help another, knowing that at some point, one of you will have to kill the other?

Similarly, with that little girl that Katniss gets all upset about (Rue?) – she was just delaying the inevitable – either she would kill Rue or Rue would kill her. “I’m so sorry you had to die…by someone else’s hand.”

And, Rue’s district revolts when they see what happens – how is that worse than all the other killings? There would be revolts every year. And, if there were alliances during the games, that would only encourage the districts to have alliances, and that would be the end of the central district.

All of this made it hard for me to lose myself in the story – it was so cartoonishly dystopian that it became silly to me.

I know that the books were made for young readers, and I think the story, at least as presented in the movie, suffers from the same kinds of simplistic plot holes and lack of subtlety that the Harry Potter series does.

2

I recently saw Hunger Games as well. I think there are two factors to keep in mind regarding this movie.

(1) there are substantial differences with respect to the book apparently, so Og knows how the plot has been contorted - I plan to read the book soonish.

(2) I chose to watch it as a commentary on our society and reality TV. I found it interesting how much the author was able to lift from Survivor without alteration - alliances, rewards, semi-random rule changes to serve the producers. The bit where they allowed 2 winners from one district reminded me very much of how they just handed Rupert a million bucks because everyone liked him, and they were afraid that people would stop watching if he didn’t win.

3

I just saw it yesterday as well. My first thought was similar in how would this continue for so long. My next thought was that it’s interesting that two humans having sex is somehow a r rated event… naked bodies in all… but children slaughtering one another for a prize is a great story to bring the kids out too…

4

The Districts are “others”. The pronouncement made at the opening of each Reaping tells how the Districts revolted. The districts suffer from isolation, starvation and military law. They only exist to support the capitol. The Hunger Games are supposed to keep the districts from trying to unite (again) against the capitol.

The districts already live under a martial law that can get you hanged for “stealing” food you grew yourself, or for hunting or owning a weapon. Death comes cheaply to these people.

Not really. Everyone in the districts understands the nature of the games, and that it’s killed or be killed. Everyone has grown up watching the games every year. They know the rules. They might not like them, but they know them. They all know it’s kill or be killed, and if their district is lucky enough to be the home district of the killers, they are all happy, because the whole district benefits. Peeta’s own mother (who is a callous bitch, but still his mother) says that with Katniss competing, the district finally has a chance to have a winner that year. The capitol enjoys watching the spectacle of the killing - not the districts.

If they were concentration camp inmates and the Nazis made them fight to the death for their enjoyment, do you think each competitor wouldn’t do whatever it took to live one more day? This is the same scenario.

The alliances aren’t friendships. They are short-term partnerships to move them further along to the goal. Have you never watched The Amazing Race or Survivor? They know it’ll break up, but if they can be a pack they can all benefit, until it comes time to kill each other. They’ll be better fed, more rested, etc.

Rue reminds Katniss of Prim, the sister whose place she took in the games. She’s the one tribute that Katniss cared about. And (at least in the book) she worried about the fact that, if Rue miraculously made it to the end, she’d have to kill her, too.

By singing to the dying girl and covering her with flowers, Katniss made Rue human. And made herself human to Rue’s district. She wasn’t another brutal killer, she was someone who mourned the death of Rue, who wasn’t even from her district. And she mourned Rue not because Rue was big and tough and could be a good alliance, but because Rue was small and deserved better. Sort of like CNN doing the behind-the-scenes storied about some family whose child was killed in street fighting in Syria - the face behind the war, the innocent victims. The capitol doesn’t want the tributes to be people, they’re supposed to be anonymous numbers.

StG

5

The movie holds true to the book, not much contortion.
The book is told first person from the teen girl.
I actually liked the movie better than the book.

6

  1. the districts are “other.” Did you not see how the districts are poor and hungry, treated as lesser human beings and the Capitol had money, power, technology, and superior weaponry? The districts put up with it because they say “better two of us than all of us.” It’s a standard theme of the downtrodden.

  2. if this is the way life has been for 74 years, then it’s going to happen that someone has had to kill the other tribute from their district. People have accepted it. And also, the Capitol doesn’t care if there are feuds and infighting in a district. It keeps them from being mad at the Capitol. And there’s also the fact that there are 23 other people in that arena. If the tributes don’t hang out together they probably will never meet.

  3. Katniss’s reaction to Rue’s death was unique and extraordinary. She was friends with Rue for just that short time and she reminded the districts that what was happening was not just tragic but worth mourning. Katniss sparked anger in the district with her “burial” of Rue because they weren’t resigned anymore to the reaping. It was wrong and because she rebelled in that little way, they wanted to rebel with her.

  4. You might have noticed that it was the “careers” who formed the alliance. These are the kids who have been training for this moment since they were young. They are ruthless and ready to kill whomever they need to kill. They form an alliance at the beginning because they can take out more of the other tributes quickly. It’s obvious they are not friends and have no real affection for each other. Peeta joins the alliance in an effort to protect Katniss. They only let him in because they think they’ll get Katniss faster and then he’ll be nice and close so they can jump him easily when Katniss is dead.

There are some plot holes in the movie, but I don’t think the ones you pointed out were problems with the story line at all. One of the main things you have to remember with dystopian societies in fiction is that they will be exaggerated. They are the extreme in order to really highlight the themes of the story. Sometimes the themes are a bit sledgehammer like, but it’s all in good fun and standard practice for dystopian fiction, especially in the YA genre.

7

Then, I think the movie didn’t cover this well enough.

No, I haven’t watched either of those, and, to be honest, I really dislike most reality TV because they so obviously appeal to our baser instincts. Maybe if I watched some of that, this movie would have seemed more believable. However, there’s a big difference between helping each other out on Survivor, where if things go badly, the person you helped may vote to have you removed, and the Games, where the person you helped is planning on literally stabbing you in the back when you’re not paying attention.

They didn’t cover that in the movie at all, of course, but it was pretty obvious to me. I would think that being in that sort of kill-or-be-killed situation would make it impossible to form any sort of friendship. I’ve heard there’s more to the Rue story in the book, but there wasn’t much in the movie.

But the MC humanizes the “contestants” when he brings them up to talk about themselves, what they want to do if they win, and so on. That’s also pretty silly – when the audience sees a cute little girl like Rue or an charming, attractive teenager like Katniss, their reaction is not going to be, hey, let’s let them kill each other. It’s another thing that really bothered me.

8

I could see the Capitol having their best fighting people from the districts, but having the districts fight each other doesn’t work for me – the districts aren’t “other” to each other – they’re all screwed in life together.

All I’m saying here is that the rule should always have been that the district kids don’t have to kill someone from the same district. If they want the districts to think of each other as “other”, then having their own team up together only helps that. Having kids from the same district kill each other would only reinforce that they’re all in this together against the Capitol.

After that long of a time, every district would have “careers”, especially if it meant food and other benefits to the district. And, the “careers” would wipe the floor with the other district kids. I’ve read dystopian books, and I guess this one just went too far for my non-reality-show watching self.

9

The expectation is that someone from another district will kill your partner and then you get to either avenge their death with a glorious win for your district or go out in a blaze of glory fighting with your last breath to honor their memory.

The idea was that districts like 12 and 11 had gone so long without winning that they weren’t capable of setting aside the resources to train careers.

10

Perhaps because the Capitol has hit upon a relatively bloodless form of repression, which is largely symbolic. The real world analogues, such as Uganda under Idi Amin, the An-Anfal campaign, are far less discriminating.

It makes perfect sense, strategically. And the odds that you would actually have to fight are low, only occurring if you happened to be part of the last surviving pair.

What makes you think Katniss and Rue aren’t aware of this? That’s part of the tension of the situation, it’s a doomed friendship.

I’m afraid you weren’t paying attention. Did you miss the scene at the start, where it explained how the lottery was organised? For each “transgression”, the minor’s name is entered into the lottery once. The games are about fear and control. There is also a scene where Katniss discusses the games with her beau. He says that the games would lose much of their power if people could bring themselves to stop watching.

Yes, it’s not a particularly subtle tale, but it is well conceived.

11

I simply didn’t find it entertaining to watch a movie that focused on kids trying to kill each other for sport.

12

I agree that the premise is unrealistic. I haven’t been able to find a single case in history in which there was general, widespread applause at the prospect of children killing children–even the children of “others.” I stake out this one last final hope in the decency of humankind–that that kind of thing would literally never happen, ever.

ETA: other than that I thought it was an okay movie!

13

I think you’re underestimating how repressive the government really is, and I’ll say it here: just read the book. I got through the whole trilogy in less than 24 hours, it goes quickly. Also, it’s a movie. Suspension of disbelief is par for the course. Do you find this more unbelievable than teenage wizards casting magic spells to levitate objects or adult wizards using magic to kill each other?

Without spoiling anything majorly plot-related, there’s a lot the movie doesn’t get into that explains why the districts haven’t revolted. If you read it, you’ll understand why it’s so easy for the Capitol to keep public dissent at zero. When your next meal depends on keeping your head down and doing what you’re told, you goddamn do it. Going into the Games, Katniss is probably the best-fed tribute from an outer district (which includes all but 1, 2, and 4) in their entire 74-year history because she *can *hunt, she is *allowed *to hunt without being imprisoned or killed by the peacekeepers (which is an enormous anomaly), and her sister has a goat. And even then, she’s still not all that well-fed. Private dissent exists, of course (see:Gale), but it’s unfathomably hard to get any kind of cross-district unification in that regard.

I think the movie is good, but it doesn’t explain things like the book does. If you find the oppression of the outer districts difficult to believe in the movie, then you need to read the book.

14

This is the part I don’t understand. It’s a lottery, how do these districts get represented by people who have trained their whole lives?

15

It’s a lottery for those districts that don’t have volunteers. Remember, Katniss was able to volunteer after her sister was chosen in the lottery. Some of the other districts have plenty of volunteers.

16

My problem is that I think the screenwriter or author overestimates how repressive a government can get before the downtrodden just say, screw this, I’d rather die than live like this. That’s where my disbelief suspension failed.

The Harry Potter stories are basically, imagine life as you know it, but magic exists. OK, I can accept that one change. (Although, the Potter stories also have tons of plot holes and, after a while, I really didn’t enjoy them very much) The Hunger Games movie says, imagine a repressive society so dystopian that you can’t imagine it. Well, I’m saying, I can’t imagine it, and I had trouble with the movie because of that.

We all have our limits to our suspension of disbelief, and I guess this one just went too far for me.

17

I actually thought the movie was pretty poorly done. Doesn’t come close to capturing the emotion and background and relationships presented in the book.

I considered this to be a live-action illustration for the book. You wouldn’t want to “read” a book just by simply looking at the illustrations; likewise you don’t want to experience the story solely by watching the movie. The movie helps illustrate the book. That’s it. This is one of those instances where the movie is simply no substitution for the book.

18

I think I have heard of that explanation before, but that doesn’t make much sense either. How do you get multiple kids, year after year, to volunteer to (most likely) die, especially without a cause? The only benefit of winning is the fact that you attain financial stability. Since the volunteers were from the better off districts this incentive is not all that awesome (they weren’t starving to begin with).

19

It’s the first 5-10 years that are tough. Then it just becomes the way things are.

The movie was obviously setting up for a trilogy about the unraveling of this world order (shown by the riots when Rue dies and the unorthodox ending to the Game).

I thought the film was okay and never read the book (my kid read them all though). It had holes but it was acceptable enough as tween lit turned film.

20

Each kid gets his/her name entered into the lottery one time, at least. If a kid is willing to have more than one entry, his/her family gets a supplemental allotment of food and fuel (and I think other goods, as well). So, if a kid is willing to have his/her name in the lottery 10 times, then his/her family will get 9 allotments (the first entry doesn’t earn any allotments).

Plus, of course, kids are allowed to volunteer as tributes.