By Megha Pendyala
In this thrilling prequel to the Hunger Games series, the audience is exposed to the backstory for its notorious villain, Coriolanus Snow. In a world sixty-four years prior to the one Katniss (the main character of the original franchise) experienced, many parts of society, and their life, are different.
Life at the Capitol while Snow lives there is a new age, as they were previously engulfed in the Dark Days where District 13 rebelled against the Capitol for its freedom causing widespread war, poverty, and starvation as seen in the first scene in the movie. As the Capitol regains its power, there needs to be a device to control the districts which is where the creation of the Hunger Games came to life by inventor Dean Highbottom.
These Hunger Games were different, however. It is merely tributes fighting in an arena; there is no show or splendor or audience participation. The Capitol people weren’t able to know the tributes like in Katniss’s era, and this caused the popularity of the Hunger Games to dwindle as they grew boring for the public.
Nevertheless, the games weren’t over yet thanks to Coriolanus Snow. With his own personal agenda in mind, Snow sees the variety of ways to improve the games and his suggestions in this prequel make the Hunger Games as we know it in Katniss’s time.
The engaging plot, beautiful acting between Snow, played by Tom Blyth, and Lucy Gray, played by Rachel Zegler, and the cinematography make for a loveable movie. What especially pops out in relation to the movie, however, is the chilling character development as we see Snow turn from a normal, decent person to a stone-cold villain. This change is portrayed subtly until it sneaks up on the viewer in the end, leaving them unsettled and wanting to know more.
This movie was a lot different than the previous Hunger Games movies. It doesn’t have as much action, and it is a narrative of Snow’s life that is organized in three different stages: Part 1: The Mentor, Part 2: The Prize and Part 3: The Peacekeeper. This is a little unlike the previous movies which are mostly focused on the games and the action while in the arena. Even though it was slightly different from the originals, it is definitely worth watching and it provides a different perspective on Snow for the later movies.
The soundtrack of this movie is what differentiates it from many other films. Lucy Gray, one of the main characters, is a talented singer whose voice quite literally is as smooth as melted butter. Her frequent songs make the movie rich with feeling and liveliness.
I highly recommend this movie because the plot was exciting throughout and the characters were very developed, unlike the half-baked characters that are appearing in more and more action movies now.
