The Box Office Games

The Hunger Games, fresh off it's opening weekend, has scored very well at the box office, especially considering it being the first film in its series.  The film is a perfect formula for modern Hollywood producers and audiences.  The action, romance, and topical themes from the novel bring in a wide audience and there are equally successful sequels ready to go.  Furthermore, the story makes for easy catering to popular cinematography and editing practice that succeed in telling the story without excessive creative effort (which also means a quicker production time).  The downside of all this is various issues that happen in page-to-screen adaptation.  Themes and morals from the novel are glazed over in favor of action and the larger story of the whole trilogy.  In the end it all worked; the film scored well in both B.O. receipts and critical reception.  



The Hunger Games novels have a structure that lends easily to a film adaptation, both in story and style.  Suzanne Collins writes to favor action and description rather than excessive character thoughts and philosophy.  Very little of the material was lost on screen as the film at least touched on nearly every scene, except a very important one at the end, but I'll get back to that.  The novels also form an epic trilogy of conflict, which everyone loves to see (Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, etc.).  Odds are, one will find only a few fans angry about marginal changes to the material.  Given that the majority of viewers who saw the film opening weekend were fans, it's no surprise that the film performed well. 

Hollywood loves to buy up as many ideas, popular or not, that it can potentially use later on.  The more popular something is, the more likely it will get made.  The Hunger Games was first published in 2008 and no time was wasted in producing a film once it became popular.  Like I said, the story was exactly the kind of thing big budget producers are looking for and when it came to the creative side, I'd wager a lot of things just fell into place. 

A sharp eye may notice that many filmmakers have adopted a very shaky camera approach that simulates a handheld documentary camera filming events.  This technique, coupled with faster editing cuts, creates a greater sense of urgency without being too jarring.  I noticed both of these at play right at the beginning of the film.  It seemed a little out of place in the early scenes because the action hadn't really started yet.  The tone was more dread and suspense, so some longer shots would have been more appropriate.   The camera work became more static once the characters entered the Capital for preparation, which worked to convey a calm before the storm feeling, as well as the perceived stability of the Capital.   Once the arena scenes began, the camera began to shake right up and cut quickly to resemble a war survival film, which was the perfect for the events happening.  Like I said, the story made amicable for the director to do what was popular, and therefore easy.  Fortunately, the film did not call for excessive computer effects or it would have most certainly been converted to 3D. 

I'm not saying that popular is bad, merely conventional, and therefore less surprising. The film is something you watch to put pictures to words, as opposed to a film like The Artist which has appeal in technique and atypical presentation.  I would say most of the creativity in The Hunger Games went to the costumes and production design of the Capital scens.  The colorful conglomeration of style looks like a fusion of Wizard of Oz and Alice in Wonderland.  The heroine, Katniss, is much like Dorothy and Alice who in turn represent the audience.   They are not in a world they recognize or understand and are forced to change themselves to accommodate it. 

So is the film all it was anticipated to be?  I'll say for the most part, yes.  The pieces of story and structure all fit together pretty well.  The action and suspense are very well executed.  Even the soundtrack was well used; being quiet and silent or loud and intense at appropriate times.  What it mostly fell a little short on was the themes from novel.  The power of reality TV and the motions of celebrity status (which came to a head in the omitted final scene of the book) were softened or removed to make room for the rebellion story arc that would come into play in the sequels.  One thing interesting I did note was that at no point does the film say the story takes place on Earth.  For a newcomer to the franchise this could create a distance from the material since there's no point of reference for how the world came to be.  If there's one thing I've learned from science fiction, it's that stories do not have to be about humans in order to be relevant to them.