Five elements about 'Hunger Games' still bother Dann
I saw Gary Ross' "Hunger Games" again last weekend, and five of the elements that bothered me the first time I saw it continued to annoy me. (Minor plot points will be revealed, so don't read further if you want to preserve your moviegoing experience.)
<b>1. </b>Where did Peeta find the amazing materials to create his fantastic tree camouflage that made him blend into the river bed? Did a makeup kit come along with the food and weapons supplies?
<b>2. </b>How did Peeta spend the lengthy time required to apply this makeup without being detected by the other game contestants?
<b>3. </b>When the cutest contestant (and you know who she is) dies in Katniss' arms, why does the camera show us her last moments through her eyes? Earlier, the camera took Katniss' point-of-view as she rose up in the tube to the battlefield.
That made sense because we're seeing "Hunger Games" through Katniss' perspective. But not Rue's. Showing us what Rue sees as she dies is a cheap, ridiculous and unnecessary way to garner sympathy for a character who's already captured our affections.
<b>4. </b>A cannon blast goes off each time a contestant dies. Except for when Rue and her assailant are killed. Why didn't the cannon sound for them? (Because it would have alerted the remaining contestants to the deaths, thereby denying Katniss time enough to give her a mini-funeral with flowers?)
<b>5. </b>Those manufactured demon hounds might have fit perfectly in a Harry Potter adventure where wizards could summon forth magical monsters and sic them on poor Peeta and Katniss. Hey, what exactly are these carnivorous canines? Animatronic robots? Plasmatized pixel creations? What? What?
There was too much fiction and not enough science for me to believe that the Games masters could simply create living, organic matter for a TV show by throwing a switch, then executing the will of its creator.
OK, it's important to know that my ignorance on these topics can be attributed to my success in avoiding "Hunger Games" trailers and not reading Suzanne Collins' best-seller before seeing the movie.
Maybe some of these elements are explained in the novel, which doesn't really count in the movie, which must stand on its own as a work of cinema.
"Hunger Games" won the weekend box office last week, and despite its flaws, still deserved to be seen over its disappointing competitors "Wrath of the Titans" and "Mirror Mirror."
<b>Trailers pollute 'Cabin'</b>
Speaking of not watching movie trailers, I managed to see a press screening of the upcoming horror film "Cabin in the Woods" without reading much about it and without seeing a single commercial or trailer for it. The movie was filled with "Wow! What was that?" moments.
A couple of days later, I saw a TV commercial for "Cabin in the Woods," and it ruined the first and one of the best "Wow! What was that?" moments that occurs long before we know what we (and the characters) are dealing with.
If you're a movie purist, you already know how commercials and trailers often buzzkill the motion picture experience for us. The marketing geniuses who create trailers do so with one goal in mind: to get our butts in theater chairs - not to preserve an excellent, pristine moviegoing experience for us.
The greatest movie marketing campaign in my memory came along in 1979 when Ridley Scott's "Alien" poster simply showed a light emanating from an egg-like image, accompanied by the classic text: "In space, no one can hear you scream." The commercials simply revealed the letters "A L I E N" over an ominous space background.
If "Alien" were being marketed today, trailers would not only show Captain Dallas being killed first, they would certainly reveal the infamous, shocking "chest-burst" sequence at the dinner table.
I can just hear a studio executive chortling, "Now that will get butts in the theaters!"
<b>Cult-ivated movie club</b>
Join me and James Bond novelist/film historian Raymond Benson as Dann & Raymond's Movie Club presents "The Great Cult Movies" at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 12, at the Arlington Heights Memorial Library, 500 N. Dunton Ave., Arlington Heights. (847) 392-0100 or go to ahml.info. Free admission! Clips from such films as "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," "Mommie Dearest," "Pink Flamingos," "Harold and Maude," and "Plan 9 From Outer Space." Popcorn, too!