My bad guys, I completely forgot to review the latest Hunger Games movie.
I have my reasons. I have my excuses. I saw the movie with a friend who was visiting me and sleeping on an air-mattress on the floor of my tiny studio apartment, and whom I did not want to ignore by writing a review. I saw the movie on opening night, and not at a preview screening like many of the movies I’ve been reviewing lately, which made sitting down to review it feel a lot less urgent. It’s also the third in a series, and so my feelings on the franchise are pretty much set, and with no major changes in style, storytelling, or tone, I didn’t feel like I had much to say.
But really, what it actually comes down to is this: I have no idea how to review half of a movie.
I do not like this trend of cutting movies in half at all. I really do not like it. Movies are not meant to be watched in parts, which I always tell my friends who try to watch half of a movie now and half of a movie later. Movies are a unique art form, unlike books or theater, that demands to be experienced without an intermission or a break. A movie is a self-contained experience: one story, one time, one emotional journey. Even trilogies and film series are structured in such a way that each experience, even if it’s part of a larger one, is it’s own thing. That’s the point of making movies instead of television shows or miniseries. That’s why people go to so much effort to cram a whole story arc and characters and world into two hours.
The half of Mockingjay I saw was really, really good. The casting of all of the characters from the books is perfect, as usual, and the film adaptation does a wonderful job of solidifying and expanding the unfocused themes from the books. The world of Panem feels even more fleshed out, real, and timely than it did in the previous films, and the story of the revolution that this film has begun to tell is told through fantastically accomplished and moving set pieces. It is a really damn good half of a movie.
It is not a movie. It is half of a movie. No matter how excellently the characters are portrayed, how sweeping the emotions of the story, and how engaging the narrative is, when the credits roll it still feels like the projector broke, and you should be getting a voucher from the theater. The film kind of tries to form a climax out of the midpoint of the story, but there’s a reason why the midpoint of the story is the midpoint and not the end- because it’s not a satisfying place to leave an audience.
I enjoyed the Hunger Games books, and I adore the movies so far, but I honestly cannot give an opinion on half of a movie, because I don’t have one beyond “where’s the other half?” A year from now, when Part 2 is released, I will gladly review Mockingjay, and I can’t wait to see how it ends. I’m just unhappy about having to wait the year to do so.
TOP HAT ROBOT 