The Hunger Games

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empther said:
True.
However,…
when all four :eek: movies have been released and people have seen them all, they won’t need to read the books to understand.

It will be apparent in retrospect that when Katniss volunteered to take Prim’s place, Haymisch must have immediately considered her a gift from Heaven as a figurehead and symbol for his rebellion aspirations. **And he must have come close to doing cartwheels when Peeta was chosen! **:egyptian:
There is no hint of this in the first book or the movie.
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Umm there would still be a heck of a lot that was left unkown or unrealized, and as to the idea that Haymitch was overjoyed when Katniss and Peeta were chosen… that is not at all true, at first he was convinced they neither of them stood a chance of survival, just like all the other tributes he dealt with before them, it took a lot of effort on the partss of Katniss and Peeta to get any help out of Haymitch in the first place.
 
, at first he was convinced they neither of them stood a chance of survival, just like all the other tributes he dealt with before them, it took a lot of effort on the partss of Katniss and Peeta to get any help out of Haymitch in the first place.
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Then why did he help them at all since this cost him?
He was very smart. He could have been playing coy. He could have been feeling Katniss and Peeta out to see what he could get out of them.
**He was encouraging their so-called love interest for the benefit of the television audience before they entered the arena.
**
The movie director missed some great opportunities. He should have shown Haymisch’s disappointment when the unpromisiing Prim was chosen, and his interest when Katniss and Peeta became the tributes.

( In the book, Haymisch was present at the lottery, but in the movie we first see him on the train. )
 
empther said:
Then why did he help them at all since this cost him?
He was very smart. He could have been playing coy. He could have been feeling Katniss and Peeta out to see what he could get out of them.
**He was encouraging their so-called love interest for the benefit of the television audience before they entered the arena. **
The movie director missed some great opportunities. He should have shown Haymisch’s disappointment when the unpromisiing Prim was chosen, and his interest when Katniss and Peeta became the tributes.

( In the book, Haymisch was present at the lottery, but in the movie we first see him on the train. )
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Yes, he encouraged their so-called love interest… but only after they fought to get him to pay attention to them and give them some sort of help and advice. He was not convinced that they could win until they showed a little spunk, he was a drunk, an alcoholic who turned to drink because he was so depressed at having to mentor kid after kid who just went on to get killed, he couldn’t take seeing all the kids he mentored get killed so he became an alcoholic and removed himself from the tributes chosen. It is only after Katniss and Peeta show some spunk and make him realize that they might, just might, have a chance of surviving that he does anything to help them. Yes he was onstage in the book… for part of the event until in his drunken stupor he falls off of it, trust me, he was not cooking up great plans for these two, he was too depressed at the thought of meeting another two children that were about to lead to the slaughter that he would be unable to save, that is how he viewed them because of his past experiences until they knocked him into gear. He was not some perfect super planner, he was a legitimate drunk because of the trauma he had endured watching tribute after tribute under his care go on to die. 🤷
 
Haymisch encouraged them to play the love interest angle during the several days before they entered the arena.

We don’t know why he was a drunk.
He may have already been a drunk when he was chosen a tribute himself forty years earlier. Kids do get drunk, you know, if they have access to the stuff.
In Iceland, all the teenagers have legal access to alcohol. You can guess the results.

Perhaps for decades he’d been sending these parachutes gifts to his tributes in the arena, but none of them showed the spunk to become survivors. He had the connections to do it. The books say he had to get other people’s cooperation.
There was no telling who would become spunky until they’d survived the arena for a while.
But first he had to send the parachute gifts to keep them alive. For example: he send them an antibiotic to keep Peeta from dying from infection. This was when Katniss and Peets had no yet sought out the enemy ( although Peeta had temporarily allied himself with others on the promise of being able to find Katniss. ). In fact, they were doing all they could to avoid the other tributes. That’s not spunk.
 
empther said:
Haymisch encouraged them to play the love interest angle during the several days before they entered the arena.
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Of course he did, I’m not questioning that. 🙂
We don’t know why he was a drunk.
He may have already been a drunk when he was chosen a tribute himself forty years earlier. Kids do get drunk, you know, if they have access to the stuff.
In Iceland, all the teenagers have legal access to alcohol. You can guess the results.
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Actually, in the later books they make it pretty clear that it was because of dealing with the tributes.
 
Peeta casting disappoints.
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I agree. Not a good match for Katniss. Mr. Wimp meets Amazon Woman.
But author Suzanne Collins made Peeta a passive “What do we do now?” character in the book.

They missed the opportunity to create a classic movie couple.
Collins didn’t do much with the Gale character either. Where’s the balance?

At least in my story, the British Prime Minister saves Theresa’s life, and husband Steve comes up with some bright ideas for some of the more difficult problems.
 
empther said:
But author Suzanne Collins made Peeta a passive “What do we do now?” character in the book. .
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Interesting. My thoughts were that the movie turned Peeta into a weak “What do we do now” boy, while Suzanne Collins portrayed him as a young man with a quiet dignity and profound inner strength.

Maybe it’s just because Josh Hutcherson is short that I get that impression? (Folks, I’m short so it’s not a dig against short people, okay? :))
 
Hmmm… I personally thought Josh Hutcherson was kind of adorable… 😊

I do wish they would have cast someone skinnier, smaller, and tanner to be Katniss though. Physically, she’s not at all in the movie how she is described in the book. Good acting on her part, though.
 
I do wish they would have cast someone skinnier, smaller, and tanner to be Katniss though. Physically, she’s not at all in the movie how she is described in the book. Good acting on her part, though.
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Jennifer Lawrence was 21 when the movie was made. She’ll be older with the next three.
I think this was a big mistake.

She did a good job of acting. But…

sometimes the main character in a story is the plot, not any named character.
The situation in the Hunger Games is such that a 21 year old actress was not needed. A girl who really was sixteen would do as well. Maybe better. She’d get more sympathy from the movie audience, and her survival would be even more spectacular…

Maybe forty years from now they’ll do a remake.
 
thewanderer said:
Yes, he encouraged their so-called love interest… but only after they fought to get him to pay attention to them and give them some sort of help and advice. He was not convinced that they could win until they showed a little spunk, he was a drunk, an alcoholic who turned to drink because he was so depressed at having to mentor kid after kid who just went on to get killed, he couldn’t take seeing all the kids he mentored get killed so he became an alcoholic and removed himself from the tributes chosen. It is only after Katniss and Peeta show some spunk and make him realize that they might, just might, have a chance of surviving that he does anything to help them. Yes he was onstage in the book… for part of the event until in his drunken stupor he falls off of it, trust me, he was not cooking up great plans for these two, he was too depressed at the thought of meeting another two children that were about to lead to the slaughter that he would be unable to save, that is how he viewed them because of his past experiences until they knocked him into gear. He was not some perfect super planner, he was a legitimate drunk because of the trauma he had endured watching tribute after tribute under his care go on to die. 🤷
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I agree. Katniss and Peeta had a “will to win” that was important.

I liked the casting, maybe because I saw the movie before reading the books.

One option for those who don’t like a character is to pretend to be that character yourself.

Then, if a “hunger games” scenario occurs for real, you will be ready, and you can do a better job than the actors did in the movie.

Lots of people are preparing for zombies etc. Some people can also be ready for the hunger games.

I liked Haymitch. So, I am trying to be a better (not drunk / not scrupulous) Haymitch.
 
Yes he was onstage in the book… for part of the event until in his drunken stupor he falls off of it, trust me, he was not cooking up great plans for these two, he was too depressed at the thought of meeting another two children that were about to lead to the slaughter that he would be unable to save, that is how he viewed them because of his past experiences until they knocked him into gear. He was not some perfect super planner, he was a legitimate drunk because of the trauma he had endured watching tribute after tribute under his care go on to die.
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On the contrary,
he must have been looking out for a tribute he could use in a rebellion every year for decades.

Of course, he could not have a specific plan until he saw what the tributes had to offer. But he was ready to seize any opportunity.

If Katniss and Peeta had refused to cooperate in the faked love situation,
he might have played them against each other, and so dominated the television audience’s attention that way, whatever it took to get a tribute the audience would remember. Katniss must have suspected this because she doesn’t express any love for Haymisch who in effect saves her neck.

That he was drunk and fell offstage in the first book is irrelevant. He was always a drunk, probably going back to before he was a tribute, and after the rebellion succeeds he goes back to drinking.
 
I had the same complaint that my 14 year old daughter and her friends had: the jerky camera movements were horrible.

They watched the movie in imax, and said the camera work was making them sick.
 
I read about half of the first book in the bookstore (will borrow from the library), saw the movie and thought it ranked up there with some of Robert A. Heinlein’s better and grittier juvenile novels–especially *Tunnel in the Sky *which had some very similar themes.

*Hunger Games *is meant to be a cautionary tale–a dystopic take on our currrent obsesions with “reality television” , cut-throat violent sports, and even immeadiate war coverage. I think most kids, especiallyn those who read the book, realize just how awful the situation is. My understanding is that the three books are part of a larger series which eventually deals with a new rebellion against this neo “sacrifice to Moloch” soceity.
 
I thought it was an interesting cross between “The Truman Show”, “1984”, and “The Most Dengerous Game”.
 
I am so glad I read all the books before I looked at this thread because it really should have SPOILER ALERT in the title! :tsktsk:

I always try to read books before watching the movies, that’s just me. I’m sure the movie is great without reading the books first, but I still feel this particular one would be better if you read first.

There are quite a few things that don’t become clear until you read the whole series, but there are a lot of things that are explained in the book that might be announced in the movie, but not REALLY explained, such as the Peeta/Katniss relationship growth spurt.

And there are so many subtleties in the book that can’t be shown in the film. (I know this is true of all books to movies, but some more than others - for this one, more.) I had to explain some of these to my boyfriend while we were watching it so he could really appreciate certain things that happened and certain characters. I rarely feel this need when watching a movie with someone who hasn’t read the book.

I will say while I LOVE Woody Harrelson as an actor and liked his take on Haymitch, I really wish I hadn’t known he was going to play Haymitch until I read all of the books. When I read I create a world in my mind to contain the characters. Knowing Harrelson was Haymitch and being a fan of his, the whole book had that “murmur” in my mind to it like all books do, BUT everytime Haymitch had dialogue in quotation marks I would hear Harrelson’s voice reading it really loud in my head - with that southern, preachy tone he uses for some of his roles. More funny than annoying, but still kind of annoying.
 
I am so glad I read all the books before I looked at this thread because it really should have SPOILER ALERT in the title!
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  1. If you don’t want spoilers, you don’t have to read the thread.
  2. this thread doesn’t give away much. wikipedia had plot summaries of all three books long before the movie came out.
  3. the kids all knew the plots before they read the books. They told each other.
    It’s not about the surprises you get while reading. It’s the feelings.
    Can the kids be surprised by anything after all they’ve seen in movies already?
 
I haven’t read the books, but recently saw the movie. I still enjoyed it. There were several instances watching it where I just got that feeling like a particular moment was supposed to carry more significance than I really understood. So I could tell reading the book would add a lot more to the experience.

I thought the movie was pretty well done. I’ve never felt such a sense of suspense with so little action (during the first half of the movie). But I’m relatively easy to please. 😛
 
I just got that feeling like a particular moment was supposed to carry more significance than I really understood.
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In the very last scene, President Snow ( Donald Sutherland ) is thinking deeply and then walks away from the camera.
People who read the books know the significance. We haven’t seen the last of President Snow. He’ll be out to get Katniss.
 
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