The popular series The Hunger Games
is being adapted into a movie that will hit theaters Mach 23, 2012,
and fans of the series are anxious to see if their beloved books will be
honored sufficiently, or turned to slander.
The practice of turning books into movies is one that has been around
for ages. Our generation has grown up with them, and learned to love
them. Many of us remember watching our VCR tape of Snow White, or Cinderella,
then rewinding it and playing it over and over again (much to our own
delight, and the chagrin of our poor parents, who have had “Bippity
Boppity Boo” stuck in their heads for the past three weeks). We were
raised on Disney and the like, learning new lessons through classic old
stories.
Then as we got older, we discovered new movies to satisfy our growing attention spans. The Harry Potter
series is one such example. Personally, I was only seven when the movie
came out in 2001. I was enthralled by the exciting story and wonderful
special effects, quickly becoming enamored with the series.
Basically, books and movies have been intertwined since as long as
any of us can remember. Yet it seems that lately, the quality of
book-movies has hit a drastic decline- or at least a plateau with a
downward-slope.
Two of my favorite books as a child, Inkheart and Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, were both revamped into movies. When I heard that Inkheart would
appear on the silver screen, I was understandably excited. The book is
filled with wonder, magic, snappy writing and beautiful descriptive
language.
The MOVIE, however, was filled with over-dramatic music, predictable
dialogue, bad acting, and was basically an excuse for Brendan Frasier to
give angsty-yet-courageous looks to the camera every five seconds.
Oh, and Percy Jackson?
The plot was completely changed, they FORGOT to put in the main
antagonist, and most of the cast didn’t even REMOTELY resemble the
characters they were supposed to be portraying. If they hadn’t mentioned
their names in the movie, I would have thought it was an entirely new
story. Which it was, basically.
So now, as a die-hard fan of The Hunger Games and its two sequels, my stomach curdles at the thought that continues to dance around in my head: “What
if they ruin it? What if they take the awesomeness that is Suzanne
Collins’ writing and morph it into something new and different? And not
different in a good way. Different in a
“why-did-I-pay-eleven-dollars-to-see-this” kind of way.”
But here’s the thing: I don’t think they will. Because I’m not
getting any of the warning signs I got from the two movies I previously
mentioned.
First off, you have to consider the cast. Jennifer Lawrence is
filling the mud-caked shoes of protagonist Katniss Everdeen, and appears
to do so quite nicely. I was initially worried that she was too
fancy-shmancy for a “plain-Jane” character like Katniss, but she seems
to have de-glammed for the role, going without makeup and dying her
normally platinum-blond hair a mousy brown.
The rest of the cast is more-or-less what I expected, with a few
exceptions. But these exceptions (such as Lenny Kravitz in the role of
Cinna the stylist) are not so crazy that I couldn't see these actors as
the characters. It still works, cast-wise.
Then, consider the special effects. In Eragon, the fuzzy dragons and super-cheesy bursts of magical light quickly turned me off from the story. But Hunger Games
doesn’t require a whole lot of CGI (except buckets of fake blood). In
the preview, the androgynous clothing and strict formation of the
citizens is all the movie needs to evoke the feeling of a utilitarian,
dictator-ruled nation that Collins describes Panem to be. In this case,
less is more.
Finally, just consider the source material. The Hunger Games
is an exciting, thoroughly enjoyable book, and its sequels are nothing
if not even better. Collins has painstakingly crafted a harsh,
unbelievable future and makes us believe in it from the first one
hundred words.
In my opinion, the books are a masterpiece of fiction. And it will be pretty hard to mess them up.
And even if they do, remember: All is not lost. We’ve still got Harry Potter.
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