The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

Catching Fire is the next in the Hunger Games series and it's going be 4 films long and stars Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, and Liam Hemsworth. There is also a huge slew of side characters with great actors in their roles. The biggest difference between this film and the first is that the director from the first, Gary Ross, has fallen to the new man in the chair, Francis Lawrence.

With that new man in the chair, we get a much different feel and a little bit of a different tone. The first thing that you will notice all shaky cam is gone. Instead, we get a great looking and well shot film. A lot of dark night photography and it all looks great. I mean, I have seen better but still much better than the first film. Now, the tone has changed but only ever so slightly. The first one is so dark and serious with very little humor and this film puts a little more humor into the film than the first one. I think the humor is both good and bad. They had the perfect amount of humor in the film and all of the jokes work and hit well with me. I think the pace of the film is amazing. It is close to two and half hours and it really doesn't feel that long in the theater. Also, I really enjoyed all the acting. No one is bad in the film. There are a few stand outs. One being Hutherson (I bet you thought I was going to say Lawrence). I liked him in the first one. In this one, I enjoyed him even more than in the first film. He seemed to have lost many of the teenage attributes of his character so I really enjoyed him and his character. Lawrence on the other hand was amazing like she always is. For example, she hits so many emotional moments in the movie and does it with grace and perfect timing. One of my favorite moments is the very ending shot and shots in the tubes (you'll see what I mean when you see it).

Now, my biggest problem with the film is this I really wanted to spend a lot more time in the Capital. I loved the Hunger Games part. It is action packed and very well done but the story that I want to see is the is revolt against the Capital. It is a very minor problem and it has nothing to do with the writing of the film just the way the books are done.  Also, the film has so many themes that it is trying to get across to the audience is just a little too much. All of them are done simultaneously and their is too many of them. Maybe pick and focus on just that one at a time could make it better but I really don't know. Not taking much away from the overall score of the film but it was just a minor thing that I noticed. Overall, this is easily the best action movie of the October, November, and December season so far. Don't miss it.

RATING
3.5 out of 4