thessalian (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thessalian) wrote2011-11-15 09:48 pm
thessalian) wrote2011-11-15 09:48 pm
Entry tags:
The Hunger Games - A Not-Review
So ... the trailer for the Hunger Games film came to my attention yesterday:
So now I have a few things to say to anyone who just dismisses this as 'Battle Royale with American kids'. Because before I actually knew anything about Hunger Games ... I admit I said it too, though mostly as a frame of reference. It's wrong. I'm not talking 'it's a matter of opinion' here; there is only the very vaguest basis of comparison between the two books, and that's 'kids fight to the death'. Beyond that ... to say that they're the same thing is to demean both.
1) In the Hunger Games, children are chosen at random. Two childen from each district, twelve districts. Of the twenty-three people that any given tribute is expected to kill, the tribute only stands a chance of knowing one of them to any degree at all as anything but an opponent, and that's a maybe, depending on district size. In Battle Royale, the tribute is going up against their entire graduating class. Your best friend, your worst enemy, your first kiss, your first love, that kid who loaned you your maths notes ... the horror in Battle Royale is showing how shallow some friendships really are, and how quickly they can be thrown aside if it's a matter of survival. The beauty of Battle Royale is the little moments where love and friendship actually prevail, if only for a little while, if only in death. The horror of Hunger Games is very, very different, and shit only starts getting real in terms of uprisings and the big shots taking notice is in Catching Fire - when they do exactly what Battle Royale does in every game: pit friends against friends.
2) The horror of the Hunger Games is in the deeper 'relationship' that the viewers in the Capitol form with the tributes. In Battle Royale, no one knows which class is going to be chosen for the game until they're dumped on the battle ground. Parents don't know until their kids don't come home; viewers don't know until the kids are statistics on a screen, horses to bet on. It's horrible, yes, because it shows a lack of empathy, but it's a deliberate prevention of empathy for the 'contestants' by the audience on the part of the government. The Hunger Games goes entirely the other way. They pick their tributes publicly, call them 'brave warriors', make it sound as though the tributes are somehow proud of what they're about to do. The tributes are brought into splendour, pampered, trotted around like trick ponies, interviewed to show the person behind the warrior, made likeable ... and then sent out to kill ... and to die. And somehow, despite how attached people tend to get to their celebrities, the Capitol laps it all up. They buy into the spectacle and, despite having all but met the people who are dying for their entertainment, forget all about it when it comes time to watch the carnage. 'How despicable we must seem to you', Cinna says ... and they really, really are. Battle Royale's Japan can only get away with saying, "This is what happens; live with it". Hunger Games' Panem asks you to like it, and smile pretty for the cameras.
The endings are also radically different, as are the takes on the theme of 'what a totalitarian government can get away with'. Hunger Games has an additional theme of how we treat our celebrities like property and yet claim intimate knowledge of them just from interviews, even as we scavenge their pain like vultures for our entertainment. I can't say too much more on that because I don't want to spoil endings and all, but ... I'll be brutally frank. Battle Royale is a personal horror of epic proportions. Hunger Games is a stark mirror of what we actually could quite happily become, so long as we were all on the Capitol side. Hunger Games has more depth and more honesty. And I do not say that lightly.
So ... looking forward to this movie. Very much. And anyone who says that this is just 'watered-down Battle Royale' can frankly bite me. As a very vague reference point? Okay. But I would advise anyone who's being derisive about it and deciding not to ever touch it on the basis of their belief that it's a cheap BR rip-off (instead of wondering about the differences and waiting for the hype to die down a bit before picking it up, like I did) to actually read the books with more than just a surface eye for once and know your source material.
Also, for even suggesting that they were the same before I read the books? I apologise. Even if I did listen for the differences and didn't make an arse of myself publicly before reading the books.
So now I have a few things to say to anyone who just dismisses this as 'Battle Royale with American kids'. Because before I actually knew anything about Hunger Games ... I admit I said it too, though mostly as a frame of reference. It's wrong. I'm not talking 'it's a matter of opinion' here; there is only the very vaguest basis of comparison between the two books, and that's 'kids fight to the death'. Beyond that ... to say that they're the same thing is to demean both.
1) In the Hunger Games, children are chosen at random. Two childen from each district, twelve districts. Of the twenty-three people that any given tribute is expected to kill, the tribute only stands a chance of knowing one of them to any degree at all as anything but an opponent, and that's a maybe, depending on district size. In Battle Royale, the tribute is going up against their entire graduating class. Your best friend, your worst enemy, your first kiss, your first love, that kid who loaned you your maths notes ... the horror in Battle Royale is showing how shallow some friendships really are, and how quickly they can be thrown aside if it's a matter of survival. The beauty of Battle Royale is the little moments where love and friendship actually prevail, if only for a little while, if only in death. The horror of Hunger Games is very, very different, and shit only starts getting real in terms of uprisings and the big shots taking notice is in Catching Fire - when they do exactly what Battle Royale does in every game: pit friends against friends.
2) The horror of the Hunger Games is in the deeper 'relationship' that the viewers in the Capitol form with the tributes. In Battle Royale, no one knows which class is going to be chosen for the game until they're dumped on the battle ground. Parents don't know until their kids don't come home; viewers don't know until the kids are statistics on a screen, horses to bet on. It's horrible, yes, because it shows a lack of empathy, but it's a deliberate prevention of empathy for the 'contestants' by the audience on the part of the government. The Hunger Games goes entirely the other way. They pick their tributes publicly, call them 'brave warriors', make it sound as though the tributes are somehow proud of what they're about to do. The tributes are brought into splendour, pampered, trotted around like trick ponies, interviewed to show the person behind the warrior, made likeable ... and then sent out to kill ... and to die. And somehow, despite how attached people tend to get to their celebrities, the Capitol laps it all up. They buy into the spectacle and, despite having all but met the people who are dying for their entertainment, forget all about it when it comes time to watch the carnage. 'How despicable we must seem to you', Cinna says ... and they really, really are. Battle Royale's Japan can only get away with saying, "This is what happens; live with it". Hunger Games' Panem asks you to like it, and smile pretty for the cameras.
The endings are also radically different, as are the takes on the theme of 'what a totalitarian government can get away with'. Hunger Games has an additional theme of how we treat our celebrities like property and yet claim intimate knowledge of them just from interviews, even as we scavenge their pain like vultures for our entertainment. I can't say too much more on that because I don't want to spoil endings and all, but ... I'll be brutally frank. Battle Royale is a personal horror of epic proportions. Hunger Games is a stark mirror of what we actually could quite happily become, so long as we were all on the Capitol side. Hunger Games has more depth and more honesty. And I do not say that lightly.
So ... looking forward to this movie. Very much. And anyone who says that this is just 'watered-down Battle Royale' can frankly bite me. As a very vague reference point? Okay. But I would advise anyone who's being derisive about it and deciding not to ever touch it on the basis of their belief that it's a cheap BR rip-off (instead of wondering about the differences and waiting for the hype to die down a bit before picking it up, like I did) to actually read the books with more than just a surface eye for once and know your source material.
Also, for even suggesting that they were the same before I read the books? I apologise. Even if I did listen for the differences and didn't make an arse of myself publicly before reading the books.