Review of The Hunger Games Movie

So like many people I've been waiting for months for The Hunger Games movie.  The books were great and I was really excited to see how the movie would portray the books.  I'm not usually one to read books and see the movie, usually I just see the movie and forget about the book.  The book is usually way better than the movie and I just hate comparing the two, so this was sort of a new thing for me.  But besides all of  this, my review will have spoilers for the movie and the book, so read at your own risk! 

First off I will say the movie is definitely not as good as the book.  The beginning was good with being able to see District 12 and Katniss and Gale hunting.  I think most of these scenes were satisfying.  Although I wish they would have showed a little bit more of life in the Seam.   I felt the relationship between Gale and Katniss was pretty well displayed with it being a bit awkward in that they both were not willing to put forth their feelings.

They did change the part with the mayor's daughter giving Katniss the mockingjay pin.  Greasy Sae at the Hob gave her the pin.  But I feel changing this didn't really effect the movie or the story that much. Although I do believe, in the book the mayor's daughter gives Katniss the pin after she has volunteered for the reaping and it goes into what a mockingjay is.  I guess what they were trying to do was cut down movie time with having to introduce the mayor's daughter and all of that so some people may be a bit disappointed by the importance of this pin being downplayed, but I think it was fine.

The reaping scene in the movie was probably for me the most moving part of the movie.   You can feel the fear and terror of the kids especially Prim.  Prim was excellent.  You feel all of the emotion of Prim being picked and her older sister volunteering to take her place.  The part was very well done.  I actually felt teary eyed because I got to thinking about what if this were me and my sister? I was surprised to see they didn't show Haymitch falling around on stage.  After thinking about this I think they decided to wait to introduce Haymitch because people who have not read the book might be confused as to who this person is on stage drunk and falling down.

From here until the games was where the movie kind of flawed.  There were parts I really enjoyed seeing like the scenes with Cinna and Katniss.  I think they focused too many scenes on the training though.  I think one scene of training would have been enough.  I would have liked to see more of the games rather than the training.

The scenes of the games felt very short and not really rewarding.  I don't know if this would have been different if I didn't read the book or not.  You didn't see Katniss dehydrated for a couple of days in search of water. It felt very rushed.  The relationship between Rue and Katniss was there but not nearly like it was in the book.  When Rue died, it was sad but the sadness was nowhere near what I felt when reading the book.  I think they could have spent a little more time developing this relationship.  The moment when it's announced there could be 2 victors from a district win was also downplayed by Katniss only whispering "peeta" instead of screaming it like in the book.  I know this is small but show some emotion!  She doesn't seem that excited about this at all.  Of course she finds Peeta easily...I know the movie only has so much time but she barely had to look.  The time spent in the cave with Katniss and Peeta is so short.  I didn't feel there was a relationship at all.  No connection.  They kissed like twice.  Believe me I didn't want this movie to turn into a Twilight with 2 different love interests, but I did want to see what I thought the books portrayed.  Katniss and Peeta were supposed to be all lovey-dovey, kissing and making a show for the audience.

The absolute most disappointing part of the movie though was the final battle in the games with the muttutions, Cato, Katniss, and Peeta.  They didn't have Peeta get bit on the leg.  Peeta was supposed to be bleeding to death and Katniss made a tourniquet to save his life.  Peeta didn't even look winded.  Peeta is supposed to be near death! They took out the scene with the hovercraft picking them up and Katniss screaming for Peeta while he was being worked on by doctors.  This would have been a very emotional awesome scene....but completely left out.  I wonder why?

Throughout the movie they showed the gamemakers controlling the game.  I thought this was cool.  You didn't get any of this from the book but I think it would really help someone understand more about the Capital if they were only seeing the movie.

Overall the movie was good.  I wasn't disappointed too much because I didn't have high expectations.  I think if you go into this thinking it's going to effect you as much as the book did you will be extremely disappointed.  I think all of the characters were pretty well portrayed. There wasn't anyone that I was disappointed in.  I hope in the next movie they elaborate more on the relationships between the characters.  I know I will be seeing the next one! Happy Hunger Games!

Chicago to Missouri

On Friday we left early to go to Columbia, MO.  This was our first road trip in the new Fiesta.  We were supposed to come up with a name for the new car on this trip but I think we kind of forgot about it.  The drive from Chicago to Columbia is about 6 hours.  And it rained/snowed off and on the whole way!

We made a stop in Springfiled, IL  to stop at a diner Don had seen on TV.  It was called Charlie Parker's Diner.  The diner was cool because it was in an old building from WW2 called a Quonset Hut. I had the country fried steak special and Don had the breakfast horseshoe. The food was pretty good.  I think the atmosphere was a little better though.

We made it to Columbia around 4 pm and we killed some time doing a little shopping.  Then we met up with Judy and Steve and went to dinner.  We ate at Murray's Restaurant.  We had to wait for a bit but we had some drinks at the bar.  Don and I both had steaks.  It was delicious.

The next day we woke up early to head to Saint Louis (about 2 hours from Columbia). Don and Steve wanted to check out the Star Trek exhibit at the Science Center in STL.  But first we had to stop at Pappy's Smokehouse.  This place was awesome!!!  I ordered a pulled pork sandwich with potato salad and baked beans.  Freaken delicious.  If you are gonna go make sure to get there early.  We got there right at 11 when it opened and still had to wait about 30 to 40 min. The food was soooo good!!

After Pappy's we went to the Science Center.  I have never really watched Star Trek but the exhibit was okay.  There was a lot of stuff to read about space exploration that was pretty interesting.  After the exhibit we walked around a bit, but most of the exhibits seemed to be pretty geared towards kids, so we left to check out the arch.  I really wanted to go up into the arch but the wait was long and it was getting late in the day.  So we just took some pictures and next time we will go up in it!

Then we drove back to Columbia.  We picked up Judy (she had to work during the day) and decided where to have dinner.  We decided on 44 Stone Public House.  It was an English/Irish bar.  They had an amazing beer selection.  I couldn't resist and had to get a Strongbow and an Old Speckled Hen.  We shared a couple appetizers.  Then I had a burger.  After eating we decided to keep drinking and make a fire at the house.  It was a little chilly out but next to the fire it was nice.

Once we woke up on Sunday we got ready to head back home. We made a stop in Springfield again to visit a store called Scheels.  It's like a sports/outdoors store. It was pretty cool.  But we were really excited to try an Irish restaurant called D'arcy's Pint.  Little did we know it was closed on Sundays.  So disappointing but I'm sure we will be cutting through Springfield again in the future to visit Missouri.  So we couldn't decide what to eat, nothing sounded good.  There were fast food places nearby and I said either Arby's or Pizza Hut sounded good.  We decided on Pizza Hut since we haven't had it in forever.....ugh I remember why I never Pizza Hut.  It's okay while you're eating it, not so good later.  So I was burping Pizza Hut the rest of the way home.

I noticed some things when we crossed the border from Missouri into Illinois. Immediately the price of gas went up 40 cents.  There were tons of political/election signs.  And a lot more traffic signs including tons of No Parking Signs on the side of the highway, which was highway 54.  Seriously...there was nothing on this highway, why in the world would there have to be no parking signs here?!  The middle of no where!  Even if someone did park there why would anyone care?!  I guess that's just Illinois for you.