Adaptations are tricky things… depending on the source material, you’ve either got too much to grapple with, or (if it’s a short story) too much room to go hog wild in.  And while it can be reassuring to have the story skeleton already there for you to drape your words upon, there also stands the possibility that you’ll  find yourself screaming: “Oh GOD! This is  a best selling book with a global fan base… how am I going to live up to that?!”

And so you dive in…

And if it’s done really, really well – when you’re finished – you get The Hunger Games.

Now, obviously when you start out with 400 pages of text, not everything is going to make it onto the Big Screen – you’ve got interior monologues that have to be translated into action (if it merits inclusion) and you’ve got to show character traits/transitions/emotional progression through visual elements rather than some handy expositional thought.  Sometimes you’ve got to cut characters, because although extraneous body-jumping is manageable in a book, it’s a bit schizophrenic for a mere 2 hour movie – you’ve got a lot of material to cover, and you’ve got to make the character choices that will best serve the story, not necessarily the audience’s expectations.

So, you boil it down – What happened/is happening/is about to happen?  Who are the key people in this story?  What are the main points of action that help our protagonist get from beginning to end?

The choices made in bringing The Hunger Games to life were well-made decisions.  They captured the world and captured the characters, they distilled the action to productive points of crisis and evolution, and they carried us along with incredible action that focused on the brutality of the world these characters inhabited.

And what a brutal world it is…

Which is where my muse and I got lost for a bit; enjoying the incredible allure of Panem, wondering what exactly it is about this story that is so gripping, when I realized - the atrocities in the film really aren’t that far from us.

Human beings will always try to make other human beings fit their idea of “right”.  Look down the barrel of a history book and you’ll witness atrocity after bloody human atrocity, all made at the behest of one person/group of people who believe that those they are oppressing/annihilating need conform to their way of thought/living/belief/etc.

It’s the way it’s always been, and it’s the way it always will be.

Because we’re human.  We’re animal.  We’re violent, lust-filled, and opinionated.  We’re predisposed to identify difference and to uniformly desire it ourselves or  scream to squash it for being “not of me, and therefore wrong”.

Which is why we connect to it so viscerally on stage, screen, or in music, on canvas, or in print.

And why we love to watch people rise up against it.

The Hunger Games shows people at their most brutal/calculated/vulnerable/and defiant… it shows us at our most terrible, raw, powerful, and compassionate.  It fulfills our need to be told “Yes, people damage one another – but no ‘system’ is permanent.”

And today, in a world where so many things seem uncertain in our lives (as it was – in different ways – for so many lives that came before us) we can go to a movie where the poor, overworked, and hungry are prey to a much more obvious, much crueler “System”.  A “System” that does not see them as the relevant, freedom deserving, human beings they know themselves to be.  A “System” that (most) audience members will know must be challenged if the people of the story are to realize their full potential and to live as they yearn.

So we lean into their struggles…

We catch our breath at their heartache…

And we cheer their small victories…

Because we feel our own “systems” at our backs, beyond the movie theatre doors, waiting to grab hold of us again as soon as the credits roll.

I loved the books.

I loved the movie.

I left that theatre tonight feeling exhilarated once again by the story, the struggles, the price, and the journey.

So if you go, and you haven’t read the books – do yourself a favor and allow yourself to indulge in the full experience of the text after this.  Revel in the characters heads and hearts.  Bear witness to characters you don’t have time to meet in 142 minutes.  Let yourself really sit with this world and it’s many terrifying implications.  Allow yourself to be swept up by the compassion and resilience of the people inhabiting it as well.

And if you already read the books – tell yourself to let go of your passion for the details so that you can enjoy seeing what you only before imagined.   Let yourself be swept up in being privy to that which happened away from Katniss’ eyes and ears… to sink into the journey playing on screen… to revel in the world the filmakers so carefully crafted for you.

Because ultimately, whether on page or on screen, the story of Katniss Everdeen and the country of Panem is one that moves us on a very human plane - fueling our voyeuristic reality-t.v.-loving barbarism, our searching idealogical philosophies, and our ever present hunger to be free.  It takes us away from our own unpredictable world, into one where we can sit apart and yet engaged, experiencing a very human catharsis from the safety of our own hungry seats.

And it does it really, really well.