The Hunger Games (movie)

I couldn't get Sweetie to go with me to see The Hunger Games. He hated the last two movies I took him to, "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," and "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." Even a sci-fi post-apocalyptic young adult story couldn't lure him.

I am one of many adults who loved reading the Hunger Games trilogy. I attended the 11:45 AM showing at a suburban theater. The public schools in the area are on a year-round schedule so that some students are tracked out, when others are tracked in. There were enough young people 12 - 18 years old, along with a good number of retirees like me to fill the theater.

The movie is 2 hours and 22 minutes long. Even with that length much of the action from the book was abridged. The backstory of Katniss' mother and father was only briefly implied, and the Katniss/Galen relationship was condensed. Otherwise I found the movie was true to the book. The point of view of the book was all in Katniss' head, not something that would work well in this kind of movie. The movie gave us more of a global view, so we could see the actions of the game makers at the Capital, and their cool technology.

I wasn't expecting any of the main characters to be black, except I had seen enough previews of Lenny Kravitz as Cinna. I didn't remember any references to ethnicity in the book, so I expected a white author to portray white people. After I saw there were two of the tributes played by black actors, I went home and searched the book (thanks to the Kindle "search this book" function). I really missed the references to brown-skinned people. That was a pleasant surprise.

I loved this movie. Some of the "Team Galen" girls were probably disappointed, but Galen is likely to get more action in part two.

I give it four stars.