The Hunger Games

[Deleted]

While I do like the trailer I thought all the hair looked terrible. Woody Harrelson and Peeta's in particular, but even Katniss's looks like a bad dye job. And I am not digging the costumes at all. At the beginning Katniss and Gale look like they were styled by Ralph Lauren and the tributes uniforms do look like something out of Aeon Flux or The Running Man. Also I don't know if it is just the scenes they chose to highlight but Katniss seemed kinda wussy throughout the trailer. In the books she was almost always stoic but Jennifer Lawrence looked she was going to cry any second in almost every clip.

On the positive Rue and Prim look almost exactly like I imagined them. Effie looks good and Lenny Kravitz as Cinna looks great. I agree the scene where she is coming up the tube into the arena really nails it. I am cautiously optimistic.

Peeta is still too damn ugly though.

[kostgard]

I agree that Woody Harrelson is rocking a horrible wig, but I didn't really have a problem with anyone else.

[angelaudie]

I'm now cautiously optimistic after seeing the trailer. I love the book series and really don't want Hollywood to screw this up. The trailer not playing up the Peeta/Katniss/Gale triangle, which stayed in the background in the books, makes me feel better.

Ok, the way Elizabeth Banks sounds in the trailer is exactly how I heard Effie's voice when I read the books. That kinda makes Effie a bit creepier to me.

As others have said it appears the film nails the tube scene. Really looking forward to the Katniss and Cinna scenes. I really loved their relationship in the books!

Woody's wig is bad but I think he's going to be great as Haymitch.

[Karen]

Haven't read the books, don't like Lawrence, but the trailer did its job and actually got me really interested in the movie, even though I'm not in the teenage/Twilight target demographic. I liked that it was basically all character and setting development and ends when they enter the killing arena/area, which made it feel appropriately momentous.

[Deleted]

Haven't read the books, don't plan to, but I like Jennifer Lawrence and most of the other cast members. The trailer looks great and I'm definitely more interested in seeing it now.

[kostgard]

I don't think anyone worried about the YA angle has much to worry about. I think this series primarily got branded YA because the protagonist is a teenager. Katniss is no Bella Swan. She's too busy trying to keep herself and her family alive that she's got blinders on for the BS Bella lives for. And dark, horrible stuff happens to people, and the people who survive are often traumatized. I'm actually wondering how they are going to keep it PG-13 (well, the ratings system is so effed up they only care about sex and F-bombs and not violence, so they probably won't have a problem).

[OnyxRose]

I'm reading the first book and I agree that it's not really YA material at all. I love it and can't wait to see the movie now.

[Deleted]

It is unfortunate that The Hunger Games gets compared to Twilight. They have nothing in common except that they both have a female teenager protagonist. Yes there are two possible romantic interests but it is no Team Jacob/Edaward. The romance is a really, really small part of the story. I don't even know if I would call it a romance.

I guess the movie is playing into it what with their Twilight like photo shoots and nail polish line. I am hoping that is just the marketing and the movie stays true to the book which it does seem to be doing based on the trailer. Still I think the movie will be a little bit tamer than the books. Just the fact that the leads look like they are in their early twenties rather than their teens takes a little bit of the bite out of it. Even given the laxer standards towards violence as opposed to sex, there is some really violent stuff that happens which I can not imagine them showing in any detail if they want to keep a PG-13 rating.

[Deleted]

Nov 15, 2011 18:28:25 GMT -4 kostgard said:

I don't think anyone worried about the YA angle has much to worry about. I think this series primarily got branded YA because the protagonist is a teenager. Katniss is no Bella Swan. She's too busy trying to keep herself and her family alive that she's got blinders on for the BS Bella lives for.

Really? I think it's obvious by the writing style that it's written for teenagers. I'm not saying all YA has inferior writing or anything, far from it, but there's a noticeable difference in the language and style of The Hunger Games than there is in, say, A Game of Thrones.

The love triangle does come to the forefront in the second book and Katniss gets a little Bella-ish, with saying she loves one guy one minute and another one, the next. I've often wondered if Suzanne Collins was made/encouraged to do that because she makes it very clear in the final book that she's sick of the Team Peeta/Team Gale stuff and it seems like she's metaphorically putting her foot down when she states that there are far more important things going on in the story.

[Baby Fish Mouth]

I agree that it's aimed at teens. I think Collins uses the Hunger Games as a metaphor for the often brutal world of high school and adolescence, especially in regards to girls and their appearances.

I didn't find the themes overly disturbing for a teen audience. But as a teen I read a lot of Christopher Pike and RL Stine, which both contained a lot of mature themes like sex and abortion. This seemed tame in comparison, but maybe I'm just old and jaded.