(released 2013)

The movie “The Hunger Games” is taken from a book of the same name by author Suzanne Collins. The movie stars Jennifer Lawrence, Elizabeth Banks, Woody Harrelson, Lenny Kravitz, Donald Sutherland. The story takes place in a dystopic future where North America is called Panem and is divided into 12 districts that are each responsible for all aspects of industry. These districts are brutally oppressed by the govt., which is situated in the capitol.

http://www.thehungergames.co.uk/

District 12, where Katniss Everdeen is from, is responsible for coal mining. There is a stark difference between life in the capitol and life in the districts. The capitol has all the luxuries and finest technologies while the districts are plagued by starvation and extreme poverty. The residents of the districts are basically slaves. The capitol has devised a terror tactic in order to keep the districts under their control. They created the hunger games where representatives from each district fight to the death on a deadly landscape. The winner is the last person standing and gets the right to live along with wealth and fame.

The hero of “The Hunger Games” is Katniss Everdeen. She is from district 12 and embodies so many qualities that make her an excellent character. For starters she volunteers for the games in order to save her sister and she is very good with a bow. She is never seduced by life in the capitol or any false promise the system might make too.

The movie “The Hunger Games” is such a well done movie with many important messages we should heed in this day and age. The script and caste of very talented actors really bring this story to life and drive home important messages that need to be retold over and over for the benefit of all generations. All generations must be made aware of the pitfalls of societies that prey on their populations. Whether we call it fascism, communism or crony capitalism society´s predation of its population is a clear sign of deterioration if not collapse. These signs take on the form of loss of freedoms, loss of privacy, extreme censorship and the control of all forms of media, entertainment, academia, business and banking.

To paraphrase the book “1984” we have to say that Panem is a collapsing society with all the characters trapped inside. The characteristics of a collapsing society include no individual freedom, (all aspects of society are controlled so organic solutions to problems can never come about), resources don´t go where needed, created enemies that don´t exist to perpetuate a wasteful war (the govt. war against its people), sharp division of social classes and castes, extreme indoctrination of people in society from upper to lower castes, the use of torture as a political tool, etc.

In such societies the populations are shown the favored class as symbols of what to strive for and the real problems and changes that need to be made are ignored and the people who expose them are ridiculed or eliminated. “The Hunger Games” has all these themes.

What a good movie.

I2Q

(commentary by  www.ink2quill.com)

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