The Hunger Games: Satire of Reality

By Douglas V. Gibbs

The movie version of the incredible Young Adult novel is exactly what the book version was designed to speak out against.

The plot of The Hunger Games revolves around a dystopian future where the nations of North America no longer exist.  Instead, the super nation of Panem has risen from the ruins, consisting of 13 districts.  A generation or so ago, however, the 13th district dared to rebel against the central authority of the Capitol, and was destroyed as punishment for their treason.  In the twelve remaining districts a game has been devised as a reminder to the twelve districts of what the 13th district had done.  The game is held once per year, where a raffle (reaping) chooses one boy and one girl from each district (ages 12-18) to compete in the Hunger Games.  The participants (tributes) battle to the death, until only one remains living.  The winner receives fortune for his or her family, and fame in his or her district.

District 12's Katniss Everdeen, a sixteen year old, has entered the reaping every year, and has been receiving extra grain and oil for her family for taking the annual risk more than once.  When her younger sister, Prim, is drawn as a contestant after being placed in the reaping for the very first time, Katniss volunteers to be a tribute in her place.

The love interests, and brutality, is definitely an important part of the story, but the real tale is about how the tributes also work to make a good impression in front of the cameras - in the hopes of gaining points with potential sponsors.  For Katniss, though, her anger is more pointed toward the Capitol, than the other participants, but she does what she can to make it look like she adores the ruling elite, essentially putting on a good show, in the hopes of increasing the food and aid she will receive from her sponsors.

Hollywood, however, somehow found a way to lose the essence of the story during the filming of The Hunger Games.  Don't get me wrong, the film is worth seeing.  But the movie is the typical picture where the cast is up and coming stars mixed with wily veterans, the effects are mesmerizing, and the action has you rockin' in your seat.  While not overdoing it like some science fiction films about a bleak future, and though the film does capture much of the energetic heart-thumping of Suzanne Collins' novel, the dark satire designed to be pointed at the very industry that made the movie was lost on the filmmakers.

Collins' novel was born from channel surfing that got her thinking about reality shows and the Middle East violence.  It is all a show, where Katniss is made ready for the camera with makeup, clothes, and lessons on how to speak to her public through the interviews she will be encountering.  Her handlers could care less if she lives or dies, as long as Katniss is presented properly to the public.  

The story is a joke about Hollywood, the media, and all of the other maddening entertainment fakeness that exists.  But in the film, the joke is lost as Hollywood tried to best present the story to the public, filling it with entertainment fakeness, and making the movie pretty much what the original story was laughing at.

It is typical, though, in this politically correct world, for the filmmakers did not want to follow the same recipe as the book too much.  The original book version made society, government, and pretty much everyone except Katniss and her family, the enemy.  In the movie, however, the poor public, and much of the government, are simply misguided folk who don't realize the error of their ways.  Only the President, the man in charge, an almost Corporate Type, played by Donald Sutherland, seems to be the only true villain.

The movie lost the tension and suspense, as well.  Katniss seems to be almost invincible in the film.  In the film, though, she is only trying to survive, but in the book Katniss is also out to please the audience in a surreal reality television kind of way.  By doing so, the sponsors keep sending gifts her way.  Her actions and her thoughts part ways in the book, because her actions are all a ruse. . . right down to the romantic tension that occurs with another tribute.  She's playing a game, making the crowd love her, earning the trust of the sponsors and the ruling elite, while thinking of how to do more than be a mere contestant.

In the film, you don't see any of that.  She is merely fighting for survival in the movie.

In the book, Katniss even admits she was playing it all up for the cameras, but in the film, you really don't get that feeling.

Perhaps it was impossible for the film to catch on to Collins' satirical machinations, or perhaps they are too much like the simplified media narrative that Collins was originally criticizing, and they just couldn't see it.

Nonetheless, The Hunger Games is a good movie. I suppose if I had never read the book, I would have loved it.  Then again, we know that usually books are far better than their movie counterparts, except maybe in the case of Rowling's Harry Potter series.

A nice film from a better book. The movie gets you thinking, but the book has you contemplating deep down in your soul.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary