The Hunger games

[Wimsey]

After this weekend, HG stands at approximately $356.3M, which is approximately 45.6M tickets. That means that it has outsold all of the HP films save Stone. (Yes, Hallows 2 made $25M more overall than HG has so far, but because of 3D sales, that required about 2M fewer tickets.) This means that it has basically caught Toy Story 3, too, which also benefited from 3D prices, and it's outsold every film since Avatar.

Given the very low decay rates, Hunger Games has an excellent shot at breaking 50M in ticket sales. It's actually pacing better than Stone did 10.5 years ago, but because the market has changed, I doubt that Hunger Games will get the theater days necessary to catch Stone's 56M tickets. Indeed, I'll bet that it will be out on BR/DVD before then!

[Wab]

Plus there are one or two European markets where it hasn't opened yet.

[cgold]

I must say that I'm really surprised that the Hunger Games beat DH2 sales even though DH2 had 3D to pump up its grosses. The Harry Potter series always had really poor legs though so I guess it's not completely shocking. I'm wondering if this is an anomaly which will not be reflected in a rise in interest in the series or if people are really more into THG than HP? I've always personally thought the Harry Potter movies were ineffective adaptations for the most part (PoA and DH1 being the only good ones) while THG's adaptation was fairly okay.

It has nothing on the HP movies internationally though and probably won't ever come close. It doesn't even have anything on the Twilight movies internationally...for now.

[Goddess_Clio]

Originally Posted by cgold

I must say that I'm really surprised that the Hunger Games beat DH2 sales even though DH2 had 3D to pump up its grosses. The Harry Potter series always had really poor legs though so I guess it's not completely shocking. I'm wondering if this is an anomaly which will not be reflected in a rise in interest in the series or if people are really more into THG than HP? I've always personally thought the Harry Potter movies were ineffective adaptations for the most part (PoA and DH1 being the only good ones) while THG's adaptation was fairly okay.

It has nothing on the HP movies internationally though and probably won't ever come close. It doesn't even have anything on the Twilight movies internationally...for now.

I have no qualms in saying that HP definitely has the larger, more passionate fan base but I don't mean to downgrade the fan base of the Hunger Games.

As for the adaptations, I agree that the HP movies were not very good adaptations and I can attest to losing interest in the films after GOF, after OOTP I was only going to the theater releases out of loyalty for the books, after HBP I was considering not seeing DH but saw both once in theaters simply because I knew I would not buy them or see them again so I'd pay my $10 and see them in theaters just to finish out the series.

The Hunger Games adaptation, on the other hand, seemed pretty good. While there were some exposition problems mostly to do with the fact that an intensely first person novel was being adapted to a third person movie experience I actually think the Hunger Games was a better adaptation of its source material than any of the HP movies. I think I almost like the movie better than the book aside from its exposition problems (and the occassional acting issue) and I have a feeling that I will definitely prefer the film adaptations of Catching Fire and Mockingjay over their written counterparts (I'm reading Mockingjay now and I'm not all that impressed)

[Wimsey]

Comparing the box office performances of HG and Hallows 2 is very apples-to-oranges. Hallows 2 had a predetermined audience: it was going to get the people who had liked the prior HP films, no more and no less. (The popularity of Hallows 1 provided a 10% increase, but that still didn't get back to the levels of Goblet.) There was zero chance of reviews or word-of-mouth having any effect, as people already had made up their minds about Harry Potter writ large. This sword would have cut both ways: getting the 2nd best reviews and 2nd best audience response of any major release had no effect, but if it had gotten Transformers-level reviews, then that would not have had any effect, either.

Instead, The Hunger Games is most comparable to Stone or Fellowship, but adjusting for the changes in box office dynamics over the last decade as well as the difference in seasons. All three films represented (or contained) well-known names because of well-known books; although most people had not read Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter or Hunger Games, most people had heard of them. That is tremendous free-advertising that contributed to good starts for all three films.

Now, at this point (6 weeks), Hunger Games has sold more tickets than either Stone or Fellowship had. However, I expect that this is where the season and years make a difference. The box office life of films has decreased steadily over the last decade: Hunger Games will be out of theaters and on the BR/DVD shelves at a point where Stone and Fellowship were still in theaters.

More important, Hunger Games is about to get driven out of theaters by the Summer Season films. This weekend, The Avengers is going to cause a huge drop. This is the "real" competition: it's not a question of people choosing to see The Avengers instead of Hunger Games, but the fact that people will have far less ability to see Hunger Games next weekend than they had last weekend. They also will have far less ability to "finally get around" to seeing Hunger Games at this stage (6 weeks, I think) than they had for Stone and Fellowship. Indeed, it is very different from both cases. For Fellowship, a slew of Oscar nominations brought a ton of free publicity and greatly slowed its withdrawal from the theaters; that, coupled with excellent word of mouth (and yet more free publicity when so many people declare that Fellowship got robbed at the Oscars!) resulted in a prolonged theater run with the film still easy to find in theaters as late as 12 weeks. Stone did not fare so well with word-of-mouth; however, WB was determined to cast the net as far and wide a possible, as this was the "flagship" installment that would so heavily influence the audience for subsequent films. Because the dead of winter has so few new releases, there was nothing like the Avengers (and everything coming afterwards) to push it out of the theaters.

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

The Hunger Games adaptation, on the other hand, seemed pretty good.

Keep in mind that there are two ideas of "good" adaptation. The one that general audiences, critics and even the Oscars use is, is it a good movie that is based on some other source? A second one that only people who understand that original work well can tell you is, how good a job does the film do of telling the original story? The Hunger Games, like Rings and most of the post-Columbus HP films was good on both scores: it (and they) were good cinematic tellings of the same story told by the original book. Now, I've read that HG fans are upset by all of the minor changes (none of which I even recognized at the time!), but the simple fact is that film did a great job of telling the story about rewriting the rules. Now, I realize that a certain subset of "hardcore fans for any franchise, be it Games, Potter or Rings, do not care one whit for this: they simply want an anoetic recitation of narrative details: I've read that a lot of HG fans are upset by trivial differences, and it's inspired a couple of articles on CNN and EW where they let Potter and Tolkien fans vent about how "bad" good films are! However, as the Potter and Rings franchises both demonstrated, Joe and Jane Public want a good telling of an engaging story. This is almost certainly why Games is having such a great run: people who have not read the book (and have no intention of doing so) are calling it a good film, and that keeps the tickets selling.

One upshot of this is that Catching Fire should have a really good box office; I wouldn't be surprised if it sells more tickets than Games as delayed word-of-mouth gets people to rent the film and then decide that they want to see the next film all the sooner. It also will have the advantage of being a November release, which means big boosts from expanded holiday box offices, and then no competition for theaters for a while afterwards.

[Liez]

I've seen The Hunger Games a couple of times and have read the books, but at times during the movie I felt, as an adaption, it was too good. Mainly the minor things like

Spoiler: show

In the arena when Katniss was unpacking her bag and got the bottle and tipped it upside down to find no water, or Katniss looking for Peeta and following the blood stains

To me, at these parts I got slightly uninterested. I felt I had already seen these before (yeah I know I read these parts in the book but still this felt too similar). They reminded me too much of the book.

Now I think (from what I've learned from HG) perfect adaptions (if they ever exist) would be too boring - nothing would be new or mysterious. You would only be seeing the story, not experiencing it. Luckily, this is reality where perfection is near impossible.

I still enjoyed the movie though.

[Goddess_Clio]

Originally Posted by Wimsey

Keep in mind that there are two ideas of "good" adaptation. The one that general audiences, critics and even the Oscars use is, is it a good movie that is based on some other source? A second one that only people who understand that original work well can tell you is, how good a job does the film do of telling the original story?

Your first example, as I read it, says is it a good movie even though I haven't read the source material? I'd say yes. The first time I saw HG I was invited by a friend, knew nothing of the characters, the story or what to expect and I cam out of the theater having enjoyed the film despite not having read the book.

Your second example seems to be is this a good adaptation of the book I just read? I'd say yes again. After I saw the film I read the book and saw the film again and I have no complaints. I enjoyed the film more because I knew the little bits of background that I didn't know the first time through the movie but that didn't trip me up in my enjoyment the first time and only enhanced my enjoyment of the film the second time.

The Hunger Games, like Rings and most of the post-Columbus HP films was good on both scores: it (and they) were good cinematic tellings of the same story told by the original book.

Wihtout going too OT of the Hunger Games, I totally disagree that the Post-Columbus HP films were any good at all. In fact, I call them pretty terrible adaptations and unwatchable for me in all but a few select scenes. LOTR was successful as an adaptation because the script adaptors (Peter, Fran and Phillipa) were rabid fans of the books themselves but knew a straight page to screen adaptation would have been awful and they were ruthless in their quest to achieve on-screen Tolkien perfection to the point where they rewrote scenes constantly during production.

What the Hunger Games has over both HP and LOTR is the benefit of a short, fairly simple plot. I read HG on my kindle so I don't have a page count but it couldn't have been much more than about 400 pages long and the writing style was simple and easy to follow and there were virtually no subplots as there are in HP and LOTR. College professors should assign this book to their students as an exercise in adapting books to scripts because it's so straight forward.

Now, I've read that HG fans are upset by all of the minor changes (none of which I even recognized at the time!), but the simple fact is that film did a great job of telling the story about rewriting the rules.[/quote]

... What did they change?

Now, I realize that a certain subset of "hardcore fans for any franchise, be it Games, Potter or Rings, do not care one whit for this: they simply want an anoetic recitation of narrative details: I've read that a lot of HG fans are upset by trivial differences, and it's inspired a couple of articles on CNN and EW where they let Potter and Tolkien fans vent about how "bad" good films are!

IMO those are fans who don't realize that if they had adapted HP word for word into a movie those movies would each be 9 hours long and not nearly as entertaining. Recreating the scene with Hokey in the kitchens would have been boring and irritating, watching Ron and Harry constantly attempt to talk Hermione into helping them with their homework would get dull and repetitive. Books are one things, movies are another. HG, like Silence of the Lambs, is one of the exceedingly few good adaptations where the movie is virtually a scene-for scene adaptation with remarkably little lost from the narrative that you'd miss.

[/quote]One upshot of this is that Catching Fire should have a really good box office; I wouldn't be surprised if it sells more tickets than Games as delayed word-of-mouth gets people to rent the film and then decide that they want to see the next film all the sooner. It also will have the advantage of being a November release, which means big boosts from expanded holiday box offices, and then no competition for theaters for a while afterwards.[/quote]

I agree. Before seeing HG the movie I had no interest in the books or films, now I've read (and sort of despised) the next two books and will definitely go see both movies just to see how they adapt them (and to pray they fix the whole third book which is a big mess of a story to me).

Originally Posted by Liez

I've seen The Hunger Games a couple of times and have read the books, but at times during the movie I felt, as an adaption, it was too good. Mainly the minor things like

Spoiler: show

In the arena when Katniss was unpacking her bag and got the bottle and tipped it upside down to find no water, or Katniss looking for Peeta and following the blood stains

Spoiler: show

I thought Katniss turning the bottle upside down to see if it was empty or not was a cavalier way to see if there was anything inside. Had it been full or had anything in it she would have dumped it out. then again, the whole try to tack a dry sip from it has been done and is pretty cliche, but she could have just shaken the bottle and listen for sloshing liquid inside.

[Rich]

As of right now, I've seen the Hunger Games movie twice, and have read the first two books (currently halfway through Mockingjay). I haven't been able to sit down and continue reading a book for hours on end since the Harry Potter series, so Collins has certainly done something right. I really like the books--they are strange, and it's slightly concerning to me that someone has come up with this idea and has written about it. However, I think a part of what makes the books as good as they are is the feeling that the events in the book can actually be real. I think the drama between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale is one which many can relate to as well. I think the books are worth reading, and right now my favorite is Catching Fire, though I do like them all.

[Goddess_Clio]

Originally Posted by Rich

I haven't been able to sit down and continue reading a book for hours on end since the Harry Potter series, so Collins has certainly done something right.

They are compelling books and have an interesting premise, on top of being very easy reads (it took me about a week to read all three) but I admit I stuck it out with the books just so I could find out the ending because half way through Catching Fire I started losing interest. I hope the movie is better.

I really like the books--they are strange, and it's slightly concerning to me that someone has come up with this idea and has written about it.

No stranger or more concerning than anything ever written by Stephen King or any other modern horror author.

No stranger or more concerning than *that scene* in Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

No stranger or more concerning than the entire character of Buffalo Bill/Jame Gumb from Silence of the Lambs.

No stranger or more concering than the enitre book and movie of the Exorcist.

The world of fiction is full of strange, concerning, weird, disturbing motivations and plots and the reason we end up loving them is because someone thought those things up and then put a character we love and/or want to root for in the middle of that situation (Luke Skywalker, Indiana Jones, Lisbeth Salandar, Regan MacNeil, Clarice Starling, Frodo Baggins, Katniss... - not that those characters' situations were especially weird or disturbing but you get my point...) After all, the entire Harry Potter series ends up being centered around a man murdering people so that he can tear apart his soul and make himself immortal. That's kind of strange and concerning, especially for a kids' book.

[Midnightsfire]

Originally Posted by Rich

I really like the books--they are strange, and it's slightly concerning to me that someone has come up with this idea and has written about it. However, I think a part of what makes the books as good as they are is the feeling that the events in the book can actually be real.

You don't read much, do you?

I'm sorry if it sounds like criticism, but those that read a lot of fiction (generally speaking) see this sort of thing all the time. Taking real-life events from history and utilizing it as a template is fairly common.

[Wimsey]

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

Wihtout going too OT of the Hunger Games, I totally disagree that the Post-Columbus HP films were any good at all. In fact, I call them pretty terrible adaptations and unwatchable for me in all but a few select scenes.

The latter films, like HG, did very good jobs of telling stories. That's why the public and (frequently) the critics liked those films nearly as much as the liked Rings and HG. And that's why the public (and the critics) disliked the first two films so much (they are called "the bad ones," after all): they didn't tell any story at all, never mind the story from the book.

How, we can add to that the criterion of "good adaptation" that it tell the same story as the book. Hunger Games and (arguably) Rings passes there, too, as does (Prisoner, Goblet & Order). However, the fact that Prince and Hallows (and, arguable, Rings) told different stories from the original book is not a criterion that the vast majority of movie-goers can use, as they have not read the books. (Quite frankly, it's not a criterion that many fanboys/girls can use either, as a big chunk of them are clueless about the actual story for most of the major franchises: but that reflects a difference in what different subsets of readers extract from books.)

And this is a big reason why Catching Fire will not see the huge box office decline that Chamber had, and might even see the sort of box office rise that Prisoner or Fellowship induced: because it did such a good job of telling a story, the vast majority of the people who saw it will come back for more plus some who see it after the theatrical run. Look at it this way: when all is said and done, people will not be referring to HG as "the bad one" in the series the way that they do the two Columbus films, and there will be no speculation about what "could have been" regarding Mockingjay's box office!

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

LOTR was successful as an adaptation because the script adaptors (Peter, Fran and Phillipa) were rabid fans of the books themselves but knew a straight page to screen adaptation would have been awful and they were ruthless in their quest to achieve on-screen Tolkien perfection to the point where they rewrote scenes constantly during production.

That is true of nearly every film: directors tinker with scripts endlessly. The real difference is that they, like Gary Ross and the later HP directors, were focused on the story told by the book. In all three cases, the books were horrible scripts, and much of the story came from stuff that was inherently uncinematic.

And, again, the tinkering was crucial here: so much of the story is delivered by stuff that Katniss thinks to herself. That's fine in a book, but death on film. Columbusesque dumbstares simply are not an effective method for communicating those thoughts!

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

What the Hunger Games has over both HP and LOTR is the benefit of a short, fairly simple plot. I read HG on my kindle so I don't have a page count but it couldn't have been much more than about 400 pages long and the writing style was simple and easy to follow and there were virtually no subplots as there are in HP and LOTR. College professors should assign this book to their students as an exercise in adapting books to scripts because it's so straight forward.

Plot and story are two different issues. Yes, delivering a plot well is important to the audience: but a film that is all plot and no story is recognized as pointless. To this end, although the plot of HG was simpler than that of (say) Stone or Rings (by virtue of Stone being fundamentally a mystery and Rings being a plot-driven epic), the story actually required greater complexity. Stone was a simple story about hard vs. wrong choices in desires. Rings is a simple story about restoring preserving natural order. Games is a story about rewriting rules, and although that sounds just as simple, it actually requires a bit more works: establishing different types of rules and different examples of evolution to overcome them.

The book had the advantage of giving us Katniss' thoughts on these things. The films had to go without: and yet it delivered this story pretty effectively. Now, Joe and Jane Public

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

I agree. Before seeing HG the movie I had no interest in the books or films, now I've read (and sort of despised) the next two books and will definitely go see both movies just to see how they adapt them (and to pray they fix the whole third book which is a big mess of a story to me).

The plot is complicated, but the story is pretty straightforward: truth vs. fiction. In a lot of ways, it is a very similar story to Prisoner, after all. I actually think that it should be easier to adapt than Hunger Games, as so many of the "true?" issues are for everyone to see.

[HersheyLipGloss]

Now, this is all going to be a spoiler, so if you are using this as a review thread, Is suggest you clear out now.

I truly disliked the movie. I felt that Katniss was in the arena for 2 days, not weeks, I thought the costumes were corny instead of breathtaking, and I just didn't get that tingling in my trachea I get with HP. I felt like it was every other movie-mildy interesting with far too much hype. I am very glad that Gary Ross is leaving for the next 2 movies. I think that if there was a voice over, even though the movie was only 2 hours and 22 minutes, it would have been longer. I was left with a deflated feeling at the end of the movie, instead of nostalgic. I do think they did an excellent job of keeping it clean.

[Goddess_Clio]

Originally Posted by Wimsey

The latter films, like HG, did very good jobs of telling stories. That's why the public and (frequently) the critics liked those films nearly as much as the liked Rings and HG. And that's why the public (and the critics) disliked the first two films so much (they are called "the bad ones," after all): they didn't tell any story at all, never mind the story from the book.

For me those movies are unwatchable. I don't care if critics gave all eight movies critics choice awards or if the public in general spouts their praises for the next hundred years, I just don't like them and for me they did really a lousy job of telling stories.

How, we can add to that the criterion of "good adaptation" that it tell the same story as the book. Hunger Games and (arguably) Rings passes there, too, as does (Prisoner, Goblet & Order).

Have you read the Hunger Games? Because the movie is a scene for scene exact duplicate minus voice overs to replace Katniss's thoughts. Hunger Games doesn't pass on this criterion, it thrives on this criterion.

And this is a big reason why Catching Fire will not see the huge box office decline that Chamber had, and might even see the sort of box office rise that Prisoner or Fellowship induced

Do you mean to say Two Towers here? Because Fellowship didn't induce a rise in viewership, it was the first one so it set the baseline Towers and Return of the King were judged against.

Look at it this way: when all is said and done, people will not be referring to HG as "the bad one" in the series the way that they do the two Columbus films

You can't say that for sure until the next two movies are released. A different director could come in and blow HG out of the water with Catching Fire through interpretation of script or visual effects or stagecraft or whatever. Or, inversely, the new director could tank Catching Fire so badly they won't even film Mockingjay.

More response to your statement about the Columbus films being the "bad ones" in the A series completed: Analysis of all eight movies in one thread.

Columbusesque dumbstares simply are not an effective method for communicating those thoughts!

... I never said they were. I guess I don't get what this has to do with what I wrote.

Plot and story are two different issues. Yes, delivering a plot well is important to the audience: but a film that is all plot and no story is recognized as pointless. To this end, although the plot of HG was simpler than that of (say) Stone or Rings (by virtue of Stone being fundamentally a mystery and Rings being a plot-driven epic), the story actually required greater complexity. Stone was a simple story about hard vs. wrong choices in desires. Rings is a simple story about restoring preserving natural order. Games is a story about rewriting rules, and although that sounds just as simple, it actually requires a bit more works: establishing different types of rules and different examples of evolution to overcome them.

I don't see them as any different or that Games required any more work than HP or LOTR actually. In order for Frodo and gang to restore or preserve "natural order" they have to do and/or acheive things along the way; they have to see what is not "in order" and take steps to put those things right. In order for Harry to understand the differences between doing what is right and doing what is easy he has to be shown and/or presented with these choices and consequences so that he learns how to do it himself. In order for Katniss to change the Games she has to be shown as unwilling to play by the rules of the Gamemakers and that only happens at the end of the movie/book when

Spoiler: show

she refuses to kill Peeta and win and instead decides that they both eat poison berries to stick it to the Capitol.

I also disagree that establishing "different types of rules" was or is necessary in telling a story about rewriting rules. Katniss wasn't rewriting any rules, she was either playing by them, avoiding them or flagrantly breaking them. Her stunt at the end of the book didn't have to do with her consciously rewriting rules, it was a way for her to thumb her nose at the Gamemakers. In the next two books she shows zero interest in rewriting any kind of rules but instead tries to avoid having to change anything or be the one responsible for any kind of change. What happens is that her actions lead to others deciding to change rules or alter circumstance. The Capitol responds to her, the Capitol introduces new measures of control over the districts because of her, the Capitol is changing rules or enforcing ones that hadn't been enforced for years because of her - and not because of anything she is doing but because her one stunt in the Games is inspiring others to change. Katniss hardly did squat and she's swept along in the stories and plots of the second and third books because of what she represents and because other people think they can use her to acheive their own goals.

The plot is complicated, but the story is pretty straightforward: truth vs. fiction. In a lot of ways, it is a very similar story to Prisoner, after all. I actually think that it should be easier to adapt than Hunger Games, as so many of the "true?" issues are for everyone to see.

(I assume you're referring to Catching Fire here)

Just because the story is "simpler" doesn't mean that it will be adapted well. Holywood has proven time and again that it can screw up really simple stories

IMO the second book isn't anything special and the third book is a mess so I'm interested in how they are adapted into films to see if the stories are straightened out and if watching them on a screen would be more compelling than reading them.

[Midnightsfire]

Originally Posted by Wimsey

And that's why the public (and the critics) disliked the first two films so much (they are called "the bad ones," after all): they didn't tell any story at all, never mind the story from the book.

Umm..say what???

You're speaking (err..typing) of the first two Harry Potter movies?
That's a joke. Had Columbus took the risks of altering the books the way the latter movie productions did that movie would have been an enraged bomb. Fans wanted a movie version as close to book perfect. I believe that the more fair-weather fans got old and faux artsy and imagined themselves more discerning for movie fare and thus they may refer to those first films as "bad ones." But they forgot what won them over to begin with. I didn't.
A pity we don't have an archived forum that old. It'd be hysterical to point out the contradictory posts that cheered that first movie. I remember when Columbus stated of making a two part movie for the Goblet of Fire, and how most applauded his desire to make it near book perfect yet again.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by Midnightsfire

You don't read much, do you?

I'm sorry if it sounds like criticism, but those that read a lot of fiction (generally speaking) see this sort of thing all the time. Taking real-life events from history and utilizing it as a template is fairly common.

I don't read as often as I would like. When I do, I don't always read plain fiction. Off the top of my head, the only books I can remember reading for pleasure are: Harry Potter, The Hobbit, Hunger Games Trilogy, The Five People You Meet in Heaven. Those have been pleasure books I can recall off the top of my head right now . I'm currently in the middle of The Fellowship of the Ring. Having taken English in college for two semesters over two years has more than prevented me from pleasure reading...that, and 15 credits worth of courses has played a role as well. I agree with what you're saying; perhaps my original post should have been written more clearly. I'm not surprised by what Collins has written about...I am more interested in the fact that her books are interesting and easy to read because it feels like they can be real (like many other books, fiction or not), which is an unsettling feeling (for me at least).

[Jayce76]

You know, I still have not seen this movie. Heard lots of things about it, still have'nt got off of my lazy butt and gone to the cinemas. I live waaay out in the boonies, so it's a pain sometimes.

[Lprdgecko]

I saw this movie at the midnight release. We got there a little late and ended up having to sit 5 rows from the very front. My biggest criticism of the movie was during the action scenes when the camera focused on absolutely nothing. It was as if the cameraman just flailed his arms around. It may have been because we were sitting so close to the screen, but I almost felt motion-sick and had to look away from the screen.

[StarsAndShadows]

Originally Posted by Goddess_Clio

I have no qualms in saying that HP definitely has the larger, more passionate fan base but I don't mean to downgrade the fan base of the Hunger Games.

HP has had a lot more time, and books, to build up a huge fan base.

As for the adaptations, I agree that the HP movies were not very good adaptations and I can attest to losing interest in the films after GOF, after OOTP I was only going to the theater releases out of loyalty for the books, after HBP I was considering not seeing DH but saw both once in theaters simply because I knew I would not buy them or see them again so I'd pay my $10 and see them in theaters just to finish out the series.

Same here. I lost interest after GoF and went to see the two DH at the movie theater out of loyalty to the books, also hoping against hope that the movies would be better than their predecessors. Vain hope.

The Hunger Games adaptation, on the other hand, seemed pretty good. While there were some exposition problems mostly to do with the fact that an intensely first person novel was being adapted to a third person movie experience I actually think the Hunger Games was a better adaptation of its source material than any of the HP movies. I think I almost like the movie better than the book aside from its exposition problems (and the occassional acting issue) and I have a feeling that I will definitely prefer the film adaptations of Catching Fire and Mockingjay over their written counterparts (I'm reading Mockingjay now and I'm not all that impressed)

Yes, the film adaptation was pretty good. But I actually prefer the book. Unlike you, I found Catching Fire and Mockingjay fascinating. Suzanne Collins has a wonderful imagination. I was a bit disappointed at the epilogue, but I was disappointed with the HP epilogue also, so...

[AnotherD]

I started watching some of the extras on the DVD. I watched the 'making of' documentary (most of it, I'm going to finish it tonight). They showed a quick bit of footage that looked like Gale in the woods with Prim. It's a bummer there's no deleted scenes, but I'm sure they are saving those for the super box set they are sure to come out with eventually.

I can't wait to watch the movie again now that it's out on DVD!

[ccollinsmith]

Originally Posted by AnotherD

I started watching some of the extras on the DVD. I watched the 'making of' documentary (most of it, I'm going to finish it tonight). They showed a quick bit of footage that looked like Gale in the woods with Prim. It's a bummer there's no deleted scenes, but I'm sure they are saving those for the super box set they are sure to come out with eventually.

I can't wait to watch the movie again now that it's out on DVD!

We watched all of the extras last night and tonight. There's a lot of great material in the extras, and the extras give a lot of insight into what went in to making the movie.

I was very impressed with the pre-planning and meticulous attention to detail, in every aspect of the filmmaking. When you see the features, it's easy to understand how they made such an excellent adaptation. I hope this trend continues with the next movies, even though Ross is gone.