Catching Fire

The Book

I somehow expected something different from the second part of the Hunger Games trilogy. It was gripping and I enjoyed the story, but we have been here before. Once the 74th Hunger Games had ended and Peeta and Katniss had rebelled against the system, I expected the revolutionary movement to begin. Katniss would instigate mass protest and defeat the oppressive Capitol and President Snow.











Instead we get another Hunger Games that pits all the previous winners against each other. No lesson seems to have been learnt, as the combatants' distrust for each other and uneasy alliances lead to more deaths.  It seems frustratingly unnecessary - why didn't they all band together, unite the Districts and concentrate on the real enemy. By the time Katniss realises this at the end of the book, very few are left alive and many protests outside the Games have been quashed.


It seems all quite slow and hesitant compared to real life civil unrest currently in Syria and Egypt, but I guess we only see the flashpoints via the media.



What it does well is examine the dilemma of standing up for what you believe in at the risk of putting friends and family in danger. The first three quarters of the book, where life has returned to comparative normality in District 13, shows Katniss still continuing her own little rebellions of crossing the fence and hunting in the woods but wanting to slip back into obscurity rather than grasp the opportunity of becoming a leader or martyr. It is really President Snow's insecurity and political crackdown that fan the flames of rebellion. His decision to eliminate all the previous Hunger Games winners is the last straw, causing even Capitol residents to feel injustice at seeing their heroes and celebrities slaughtered.



Hunger Games film website




The Film

Every hero has their origin story and I guess that Catching Fire is Katniss Everdeans'. It is clear from her nightmares and visions (in one scene she is hunting and shoots a turkey, but imagines she has killed a child) that Katniss has mental scars from the Hunger Games and cannot forget what she was put through. As she is toured around the District, she learns that she cannot forgive either. By the end of the film, the close up shot on Jennifer Lawrence's face as despair turns to steely determination, leaves you in no doubt that Katniss is going to be a force to be reckoned with.

There is a great menace developed by Donald Sutherland's President with veiled threats and hatred portrayed brilliantly; the scene at the Presidential Palace, where Sutherland sips his white wine and blood flows back into the glass because he has been biting his tongue, for example, is subtle but effective.

The film flows along quite nicely, skipping some of the early scene setting in District 12 and moving into the next set of Games. We are treated to more of an effects laden Games, as there is less one on one combat by the participants and more tricks thrown at them by the Capitol and Plutarch, the gamesmaker. This ups the anti while the group are in the arena and aims to make more of a spectacle than the first games.

Reading the book beforehand took away some of the element of mistrust and misdirection that may have had audiences wondering who was on what side. Certainly it was not made so clear that Plutarch was a member of the rebellion (he did not have a mockingjay pin or show Katniss his watch as a clue to the Games in the film) and it left some members of the audience confused at the end as to why he was on the rescue mission.  

The soundtrack employs the familiar themes that James Newton Howard composed for the first film, thankfully, and not the songs promoted as the soundtrack, although Coldplay do feature in the credits. Why do they bother to produce an album of music "inspired by" the film? Who buys it?