Hunger Games Review

I and all the teens, plus their parents (thanks for the ride, mom and dad!) saw Hunger Games tonight. Verdict: Excellent, fantastic, phenomenal adaptation.

Bullet-point list of my favorite parts --

Casting

• Lenny Kravitz as Cinna. I loved him so much. He was perfectly cast, and he is going to break my heart in the next movie.
• Woody Harrelson as Hamitch. Marry me. Well, stop drinking first, then marry me.
• Elizabeth Banks as Effie Trinket. Um, that's Jack Donaghy's wife! She was particularly excellent in the Reaping scene. So enthusiastic, so clueless.
• Stanley Tucci was made for Caesar Flickerman.
• Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson. Spot on.  Katniss and Peeta look exactly, exactly as I imagined them. And she is gorgeous, my goodness.
• Donald Sutherland -- You, sir, scare me no matter what role you play. If I saw you walking down the street I would assume I was about to meet some type of twisted, cruel fate.

Visuals

• The most visually stunning parts of the movie were the beginning scenes in District 12. I think the film makers did an excellent job juxtaposing the poverty of the area with the pomp and richness of the visiting Capitol guests without over doing anything. 
• There were parts of the arena that looked exactly, exactly as I imagined them. I love it when a book is translated the way you imagined. That doesn't happen often.
• The nightly recaps inside the arena that were broadcast in the sky were very well done. I wasn't sure how that would work on film, or if the announcements would sound cheesy, but they pulled it off. 
• In general, the directors were just very smart about the visual story telling.  I think when people adapt works of fantastical fiction what they often forget is that we are supposed to believe that the story is real. In their effort to portray the magic on screen they often lose the realness that authors try so hard to hook you into. Not so with this movie. I never felt like they were trying to make me believe that OMGOODNESS IT'S HUNGER GAMES!!!  It was what it was. In the book it says there was a cornucopia in the middle of a field, so there you go, there it is. The filming was clear and bright, no tricky lens work, no gauzy overlays -- it was what it was. You see everything the way you would see it if it was happening in real life. I appreciate the filmmakers giving the viewers that opportunity.

Tone

• As I said, the visuals in District 12 are stunning. The tone for the film is set right off the bat. Love, loved the cinematography.
• And here is my favorite part of the movie - There is little to no scoring for most of the film. I loved that. I think it really dropped you into the action because you experience everything the way the characters would. No playing on your emotions with sad, heart wrenching music (cough, Lost, cough), or big heroic sweeps, just silence. I also think this was a smart idea because it allowed a stronger focus to be placed on the songs of the Mockingjays, which is maybe not a crucial part of the three books, but it is a connecting factor, a common thread throughout.

Characterizations

• The relationship between Katniss and Prim felt so real, as did the relationship between Katniss and her mother. There was always a part of Katniss that I felt I never got while I was reading the books, but something clicked as she was saying goodbye to her family, especially during her parting words with her mother. It just worked. 
• Knowing now what I know about the Gale and Katniss, I think they did a good job of laying that foundation. PS -- I thought Collins handled their relationship so well in Mockingjay. That moment in the book when they come to grips with the parachute thing, what Gale realizes at that point about their relationship, wow. So sad, but I felt it was what would have happened, and what was there all along if you were looking for it.
• The Capitol idiots. Only in the background, but completely believable. I could see our world being that world. We've done similar things before, right?  Panem et circenses, indeed. 

The funny thing is that I didn't read Mockingjay until this week even though I bought the book the day it was released. I just didn't want the story to end, and I didn't want to deal with more sadness. As I was watching the movie I remembered how incredibly sad this story is. Real people really die. Children murder children, teens murder teens. Panem is a horrible place. The people in the Capitol are vapid idiots who cheer on a yearly blood bath. President Snow is completely evil. Seeing the Hunger Games movie makes this very real. I wouldn't take anyone under the age of 12 to see this one. A tribute death shocks every time. The killing doesn't stop, but at the same time, it's never gruesome or over the top. I don't know how they struck that balance, but while I felt unsettled I never felt grossed out.

All in all, I totally loved it even though my heart is broken. The Rue thing will d.e.s.t.r.o.y. you. Katniss saying goodbye to Cinna before she rises up into the arena will crush your soul. You will be filled with hot, mad rage as you watch the kids prepare for the games and realize that it isn't a joke, they actually do this. But, somehow, I loved the experience. Well done, Hunger Games, well done.

And now I'll end on maybe a weird segue, but it's wrapped up in my Hunger Games experience, so here you go. 

Undoubtedly, as you read the books or watched the movies you said to yourself, 'I'm so glad this isn't real!' Well, as I was reading Mockingjay this week, and again while I was sitting in the theater tonight, another story kept coming to the forefront of my mind. A story about young, poor children separated from their families, dragged into mortal combat by the evil machinations of those in power, and forced to live lives that we could not possibly imagine were real. This story, like many others, is completely true. I found it in a book that I read in DC called A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah. 

Please find it at your library, or buy it online or from a bookstore. Beah is an excellent writer. This book rocked me to my core, and I don't say that lightly. There are children right now in this world living through unimaginable trials. Horror is a part of every day life for too many. We need to be aware of these stories, and find ways to help.

:::Used Books:::

On Saturday I went to the funniest little used bookstore near Eastern Market. Books were crammed everywhere, everywhere, even along the staircase, making for a tight walk up to the second floor.

Foreign language books were in the bathroom where opera was playing.

Books were stuffed into closets and around chairs. They really utilized every single space, and then some.

One of the shop owners is an endearing curmudgeon type. There are funny signs all over the store, such as a sign over a stack of books about George Washington that says, 'George Washington lies here.' Near the register there are some featured books set out with humorous tags.

These were my favorites --

I stayed for a while, but then gaggles and gaggles of GW students poureded in, so I made my exeunt. I'm sure I'll be back though.

:::Icy Conditions:::

We had a bit of freezing rain last night. When the sun came up this morning I saw that the twinkle lights on my balcony had been delicately encased in ice.

The vacant lot that I walk across in the morning was completely iced over.

It was pretty cool. I don't know why I like harsh winter weather, but I do. Under the surface of the semi-translucent ice, rocks, sticks, and hay were still visible. I half expected to see some dead faces down there as well.

Going contrary to anything that has ever happened before in the history of our office, the powers that be decided that we wouldn't open until 11 am today due to the poor road conditions the ice storm caused. They sent out an alert to everyone's voicemail, but we never open late so most people didn't even think to call and check their messages. I arrived close to my normal time but chose to do a crossword puzzle and eat a Cadbury bar until starting time.

The Express is a Washington Post commuter paper. Their puzzle is always easy, so it's fun to do. The candy bar was from my boss's daughter who just came back from some kind of study abroad in London. She said her daughter was so happy to be home because, 'It's so boring over there and there's nothing to do.' I'll give you a minute to process that one.

Have you heard of this book? Probably, I'm slow on the uptake sometimes.

It's fun. The book is made up of short, conversational book recommendations based on different themes such as Bicycling, Les Crimes Noir (that's French for The Crimes Noir), First Lines to Remember, Italian American Writers, Mothers and Sons, World War I Fiction, etc. She gives a few authors their own entries, such as the wonderful and delightful Barbara Pym.

Anyhow, check it out. There's a second edition as well that is probably waiting for me on the hold shelf across the street at my local branch. I have a serious 'holds' habit.


Ha! I just remembered this quote --

"Sir, When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life."

Seriously.

:::Guernsey Literary and...(snore...)...What?!:::

I'm currently reading The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, and I'm having the hardest time engaging with the plot and characters. In general, I'm...bored. Reading it feels like a chore.

But, I don't dare go against the New York Time Best Seller list, or the always prominent New Releases tables at Barnes and Noble from which most of us find our reading material (admit it). I will persist.

Boo.

Well, maybe I'll just take it back to the library and give it a go some other time when I'm more in the mood. It would be a shame to ruin a potentially positive reading experience.


Edit: Things just picked up. Good thing, I really want to like this book.

:::no fond return of love:::

i just finished my second barbara pym -- no fond return of love -- and i am so happy that i was not disappointed. i love the way pym captures the every day occurrences of life with witty insights and playful interactions between her characters. i think she is a fabulous author and i wish more people read her books.

so far as i can tell, pym tends to write about single women who are dealing with their spinsterhood in comical yet earnest ways. undoubtedly, anyone who likes high comedy and has the patience for an older book would enjoy her writing, regardless of whether or not they were married.

in short, the story centers around dulcie mainwaring, a single woman in her late twenties, i believe, who begins to stalk professor aylwin forbes after meeting him at a literary conference. yes, there is more to the story than that, but the plot grows from the main storyline of dulcie and her friend viola dace endeavoring to find out more about aylwin.

in case you can't see what it says, on the cover, it is a quote from the new york times thay says, "the novelist most touted by one's most literate friends." so...i guess that makes me your most literate friend. please, don't be stinting with you praise.

without any further ado, here are my favorite quotes from no fond return of love...

"dulcie always found a public library a little upsetting, for one saw so many odd people there, and it must be supposed that a certain proportion came in because they had nowhere else to go. others were less easy to classify and less worrying."
page 52


"'there are some people one could never cease to care for,' said viola, 'and I suppose aylwin is one of those.'

'obviously every man must be that to some woman,' said dulcie, 'even the most unworthy man...those are the people from whom one asks no return of love, if you see what i mean. just to be allowed to love them is enough.'"
page 75


"'you young women nowadays are so much cleverer than we were.'

'and yet,' said dulcie, feeling that she knew what was coming, 'you were probably happier than we are.'

'oh, I wouldn't say that. but life was simpler then. we made our own pleasures. Perhaps in some ways we were more serious -- felt our responsibilities more.'"
page 80


"and the way she had looked -- so fragile and appealing with her fluffy curls, almost a 'girl wife' -- had been such a refreshing change from the frightening elegance, frosty bohemianism, or uncompromising dowdiness, of those women who could really have entered into his work and would probably in the end have elbowed him out of it altogether.
page 81


"'the man in the queue after me asked for baked beans, and he got them. he was laughing and joking with the girl who was serving -- you know the way they do -- i didn't say anything, but i was quite upset.'


'yes, i know, that's what life is like. and it is humiliating. one feels a sense of one's own inadequacy, somehow, almost unworthiness,' said dulcie thoughtfully."
page 88


"the young woman seemed a more elegant version of herself, rather as dulcie might have looked if some woman's magazine had taken her in hand."
page 89


"it was sad, she thought, how women longed to be needed and useful and how seldom most of them really were."
page 103


"it seemed -- though she did not say this to viola -- so much safer and more comfortable to live in the lines of other people -- to observe their joys and sorrows with detachment as if one were watching a film or a play."
page 108

"dulcie herself was to travel home with laurel on Christmas Eve to spend the holiday with her sister charlotte and her family. It would be better than spending Christmas alone in london, she knew, yet she felt reluctant to uproot herself and be reduced in status to the spinster aunt, who had had an unfortunate love affair that had somehow 'gone wrong' and who, although she was still quite young, was now relegated to the shelf and good works."
page 109


"she went on to wonder why anybody married anybody. it only brought trouble to themselves and their relations."
page 141


"'but he's a celibate, of course.' here her tone took on a sterner, more vigorous note. 'and anyone can see that. it sticks out a mile.'

dulcie caught viola's eye and she wanted to laugh, though one could see what she meant. celibacy so often did stick out a mile, and not only among clergy."
page 149


this quote is in regards to her stalking of aylwin forbes -- "oh -- don't you know how it is! one goes on with one's research, avidly and without shame. then suddenly a curious feeling of delicacy comes over one. one sees one's subjects -- or perhaps victims is a better word -- as being somehow degraded by one's probings...'"
page 171


"some thin slices of meat were now served, and little dishes with just enough vegetables for two were placed on the table. remembering that it was friday -- and Good Friday, too -- dulcie glanced to see whether the clergyman was having fish. but he was not, and did not appear to object to what was put before him. dulcie was disappointed, having hoped for some spirited protest or whispered conference between him and the waitress. she supposed he must be rather Low Church."
page 177


"it so happened that the evening chosen was also laurel's last evening at dulcie's house, before she left to 'take residence', as it were, in the flatlet house in quince square. it had not been so difficult as had been feared, to persuade her parents to agree to the arrangement. charlotte, laure's mother, revealed an unexpected and presumably long suppressed desire to live a 'bachelor gir'ls' life in london; the idea of a bed-sitting room with a little cooker hidden away in a cupboard, a concealed washbasin and a divan bed piled with cushions was to her as romantice as an elopement to the south of france with a lover might have seemed to one of a different temperment."
page 115


"it was at this point that somebody came to the unoccupied table, but as she was a woman of about forty, ordinary-looking and unaccompanied, nobody took much notice of her. as it happened, she was a novelist; indeed, some of the occupants of the tables had read and enjoyed her books, but it would never habe occurred to them to connect her name, even had they ascertained it from the hotel register, with that of the author they admired."
page 176


"He would have preferred an emptier carriage, and had seen one with only a single lady in it, but just as he was about to enter it he had noticed that the lady was miss randall...she in her turn, and of course without his knowing, had avoided him at an earlier stage in the journey when she had seen him standing at the bookstall...thus, there may be mutual avoidance between men and women, the men not always realizing that they are not the only ones to be practising the avoidance."
page 208


"they're engaged, ducie thought, disliking herself for the slight sinking feeling she experienced. and it will be all jolly, and i shan't really know what to say."
page 223


ETA: aaah! these picture issues are driving me nuts. i will fix them when i get home tonight.