The Hunger Games, lets have those reviews.

Originally posted by nixie_nox
reply to post by boncho

 

You can connect one movie but not another?

Its about throwing children into a survival situation.

Any movie can be said of robbing ideas from someone else.

I'm just going to pretend you haven't seen Battle Royale so your ignorance can be forgiven:

In the future, the Japanese government captures a class of ninth-grade students and forces them to kill each other under the revolutionary "Battle Royale" act.

Battle Royale

Set in a future where the Capitol selects a boy and girl from the twelve districts to fight to the death on live television

The Hunger Games




Compared to:

Lord of the flies

Lord of the Flies is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning author William Golding about a group of British boys stuck on a deserted island who try to govern themselves, with disastrous results.

There are a number of survival stories similar to Lord of the Flies, however, the Government selecting a group of kids and forcing them to fight to the death, is not one of them...




Battle Royale



Hunger Games Trailer.

The difference between the two, is one is made for Hollywood, and has all the useless backstory needed so people can feel like they know the character. In Battle Royale, the characters are borne out of their actions and the situations they're in. And you are left to learn about the characters over time, instead of having a heroine (main character) dropped on you from the first take.

I enjoyed it. Thought it was pretty interesting and it kept me into it the entire movie. And the ending had me wanting to see what happens next.

Originally posted by boncho
In Battle Royale, the characters are borne out of their actions and the situations they're in. And you are left to learn about the characters over time, instead of having a heroine (main character) dropped on you from the first take.

There's actually a Director's Cut of Battle Royale that includes more scenes which gives more background to some the characters (mostly about Shuya and Mitsuko). It's about 9 minutes longer than the original cinema release and adds a lot, it's really well done and the version to watch.

(And everybody should stay away from Battle Royale 2, that movie is complete crap)

Hunger Games is what you would expect from the USA: A very lame, watered-down and more political correct rip-off. The Books were quite lame and the movie is even more dumbed down and turns everything into a kiddie version (PG-13 really is not suitable for such a movie)

I would recommend reading the book first. I haven't seen the movie either, but I thought the book was well written. It was a good story! If you see the movie first you may not have as much motivation to read the book. And we all know that books are typically better than the movie version

I've read the original Battle Royale novel (but not the manga), saw the movie, read the Hunger Games novels, saw this first movie. Are there similarities? Yeah, there are, but guess what: Battle Royale didn't invent people fighting to the death at the whim of governments. And just because they're young people doesn't mean anything. You have to go somewhere with ideas? Elderly people fighting to the death would be entertaining, but it wouldn't be very exciting.

Just because things have similar plots, doesn't mean they're the same and doesn't mean they don't have their own merits. The author said she didn't know about Battle Royale, I'm willing to believe her. Why? Because, and I'm stereotyping here, cult Japanese movies and novels aren't usually on the radar of 40-year-old women. Maybe she ripped off "Running Man!" Maybe it's like she said and she based it off gladiatorial games.

I don't like rip-offs any more than the next person, but I've noticed this stupid trend of people not allowing things to be similar or to pay homage.

Hunger Games was born out of a fast growing genre. I don't like the idea of Young Adult or Teen fiction, because it means young people are being coddled instead of being given more challenging things to read. Battle Royale is much more challenging than Hunger Games, but Hunger Games still has merit.

It has a strong, capable, active female protagonist. Always a nice thing in my opinion. It's a quick, exciting, pulpy read. And most importantly, it brings up issues of government control and morality to young people. Especially, TEENAGED GIRLS who are eating these books up. Now, how can it be a bad thing that young women are being given a strong role model, are READING (and reading a genre they probably wouldn't be willing to read (sci-fi)) and are being given situations that they might not think about otherwise? Hopefully, it will spur them on to better, more challenging books.

And who are these people who are going "Ugh, character development!" Yeah, I sure hate it when I know who people are and what there situations are like. You know what has character development and back story? The novel Battle Royale. And not just about the main characters, about a bunch of them. We learn the stories of what are basically future corpses. I know, the movie doesn't have it. So, i guess, the movie's a watered down version of the book. And, I guess that makes people who like the movie a bunch of dummos, right? Or not, because that's a stupid and narrow way to look at things.

I wonder how many people have read/watched Battle Royale and also read/watched Hunger Games. There's a lot of difference once you get past the similar premises. Also, the Hunger Games books get further from Battle Royale as they go on. They're separate things that look the same. All cars look the same, they do basically the same thing, but if you get in the driver's seat you'll notice the difference.

And before anyone says it: No, I'm not some angry Hunger Games fanboy. I read and saw Battle Royale years before Hunger Games. Battle Royale is a better book about the subject, more brutal, less hope. Hunger Games builds a more interesting world and is a more entertaining read, but pulls too many punches. If I had to choose which movie to watch, I'd go for Battle Royale. As for the Hunger Games movie, it's good. One of the most faithful adaptations I've seen, well acted, did what they could with the PG-13 rating. The books are a bit better.

So, yeah, that's basically what I think of the Hunger Games movie.

I thought it was weak, they didn't even bring down the Capitol at all, or anything. BS if you ask me.

reply to post by boncho


So your complaining that HG is a ripoff of
BR but now your trying to explain how they are different.

reply to post by ShadowAngel85


You people do know that it is geared to teens, and not adults, right?

The usual and very predictable anti -hollywood people can't even tell the difference between a movie for adults and a movie for teens.

I read the Hunger Games trilogy, mostly because my 10-yr old daughter was begging me to let her read them, and I wanted to find out for myself if they were appropriate. I didn't think they were any more violent than the last Harry Potter books, so I let her read Hunger Games. I liked the strong female character in the story, so I thought it would be good for my daughter to read it.

I just saw the movie last night with my daughter. She LOVED it, I was less impressed. With the exception of the main character (Katniss), I just didn't feel engaged with any of the other characters. I loved Rue in the book, but just didn't feel much for the girl in the movie. I don't know if it was an acting/casting problem, or a scripting problem, but I didn't feel connected to the characters in the movie at all. I loved reading the Harry Potter books, and I thought the movies did an excellent job of capturing the stories and the characters' personalities. Didn't feel that that way with Hunger Games.

Regarding your comment about the book/movie being targeted to teens, boy you are right about that. My daughter is already in debates with her friends on whether they are "team Gale" or "team Peeta".

Never read the books. Saw the movie yesterday and left very disappointed. Little character development. The romance part was totally stupid. Written for 12 year olds who take lithium or other anti-depressive meds that num their brains too much to care about plot.

Originally posted by nixie_nox
reply to post by boncho

 

So your complaining that HG is a ripoff of
BR but now your trying to explain how they are different.

I was a little quick to judge as I didn't search for the original authors comments, where they stated they wrote the Hunger Games without be previously exposed to BR.

So I would strike this sentence from my posts.

It wasn't the worst movie in the history of film making. But it was another terrible attempt at basing an idea of great Asian cinema (see: The Departed.)

In any case, it is two different tellings of the same story. And I think BR did a much better job.

It wasn't a horrible movie I saw it last night. It reminded me of a kids version of a mixture of 1984 and the movie the condemned.

reply to post by nixie_nox


I watched Battleship last night and I thought it was the worse movie Ive ever seen but then I turned on Hunger Games and after 30 minutes, I decided that it was actually the worse move Ive ever seen.

Just watched it this afternoon. It was ok. But as stated above it definitely takes a bit from Battle Royale(which I have loved for years). The plot definitely caters to the teens(like most hollywood bs these days).

After watching it, just made me want to watch BR again. So that is what I'll be doing tonight.