A Critique of the Hunger Games

A Critique of The Hunger Games The Hunger Games is the first movie of a trilogy based on the books written by Suzanne Collins. The story takes place in post-apocalyptic America a nation now called Panem ruled by the Capital. Panem consist of twelve districts each responsible for growing or manufacturing goods for the capital. The Capital keeps control by oppressing the citizens and forcing each district to provide one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18 to compete in the Hunger Games. In the Hunger Games all of the contestants are put in an arena together to fight to the death until only one remains. With use of sound, costumes, special effects, and the right actors Director Gary Ross and crew where able to create a memorable film that would be loved by fans and non-fans alike. This 2012 film was directed by Gary Ross who also co-wrote the screen play with Suzanne Collins and Billy Ray. It was important to them to make sure that the movie was an adaptation of the book. The book is told in Katness’s point of view so they wanted to portray that throughout the movie. In a 2012 interview Ross said “I hope that this is a first person narrative where you feel like you are walking in her shoes, because if you ever… One, we wanted it to remain totally real, like we talked about last night. Two, that it feel urgently from her point of view and that everything you’re perceiving, the ambiguities, even the uncertainties, even the lack of clarity about Peeta, you need to walk in her shoes (Ross 2012).” An advantage of using the first person narrative is that you do get to see this world the way she does. It adds to the excitement and suspense of the games. One way he was able to accomplish this was in the way he shot the movie. He chose to use hand-held cameras in many of the scenes and avoided using to many wide shots. This helped to give the impression that you are seeing it from Katniss’s eyes. The use of hand-held cameras could be shaky at times