The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes earns 3 stars from Us Weekly movie critic Mara Reinstein.
Not only has the franchise been absent from the moviegoing consciousness since 2015, it’s a prequel. Shrug. The let’s-see-how-we-came-to-be storyline didn’t effectively fly for epics like Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. Why would revisiting the post-apocalyptic world of Panem result in a change for the better? We already know District 12 is doomed for decades. It’s not like Jennifer Lawrence is going pop up playing the long-lost ancestor of Katniss Everdeen.
We’re dropped off at the 10th annual Hunger Games, in which two youngsters from each of Panem’s districts are still chosen at random to fight to the death on TV. The female representative from lowly District 12 is Lucy Gray Baird , a traveling musician who makes a spectacle of herself at the reaping ceremony by tossing a snake down the back of a snobby rival and then belting out a defiant anthem. Tasked to be her mentor: A teen named Coriolanus Snow .
The unfolding drama is at least visually interesting. During this particular time in Panem, the Tributes must survive in a primitive low-fi arena that keeps the battles front and center. Meanwhile, everyone watches the action on retro 70s-era TVs. The Capitol itself is more sterile authoritarian than post-apocalyptic glam. All the above is a good thing — at 158 minutes, moviegoers might as well be treated with top-rate and expensive-looking production values.
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Source: screenrant - 🏆 7. / 94 Read more »