The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is out November 17th with the review embargo having lifted this week. The prequel brings back Francis Lawrence, director of parts II-IV of the massive Jennifer Lawrence franchise. Tom Blyth (as the younger version of Donald Sutherland’s Snow) and Rachel Zegler lead the cast.
The film is nearly certain to have the lowest opening of the five features in the series. It would need to break $100 million not to and it might be fortunate to take in half of that out of the gate. Snakes currently has the lowest Rotten Tomatoes meter in the quintet at 67%, just under the 70% earned by both editions of Mockingjay.
Despite lauded production design and some decent original songs, Oscar voters completely ignored all previous Games. The best and probably only shot that Ballad has is a ballad from Olivia Rodrigo titled “Can’t Catch Me Now”. My guess is the Academy will still show no appetite for Hunger. My Oscar Prediction posts will continue…
Serving as a prequel to the four films that generated nearly $3 billion worldwide, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is out November 17th. The dystopian adventure returns Francis Lawrence (who made the second through fourth editions) to the director’s seat. Tom Blyth (as a younger version of Donald Sutherland’s Snow), Rachel Zegler, Peter Dinklage, Hunter Schafer, Josh Andrés Rivera, Jason Schwartzman, and Viola Davis lead the cast.
Arriving eight years after Jennifer Lawrence’s Katniss concluded her boffo business, Snakes is expected to have the lowest start of the Games… by a wide margin. Based on the 2020 novel from Suzanne Collins, this series may not be the phenomenon that it was onscreen from 2012-15. That quartet of titles all made over $100 million during their opening weekends with 2013’s Catching Fire setting the high mark at $158 million.
Early word-of-mouth is pretty decent, but this may earn about half of what 2015’s Mockingjay: Part 2 accomplished out of the gate ($102 million). If you’re setting the over/under at $50 million (which is reasonable), I’d suggest the under (if not by much).
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes opening weekend prediction: $48.3 million
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Over the last near four years, The Hunger Games franchise begat the true birth of YA novel adapted pictures that have continued with diverging and maze running. Perhaps more importantly, it gave the masses Jennifer Lawrence who’s gone onto quite an impressive career thanks to this series and David O. Russell with Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle, and the upcoming Joy. It also gave its studio Lionsgate a serious cash cow and that explains the decision to divide the final installment Mockingjay into two parts. They did so because they knew the cash cow was about to graze and last year’s Part 1 felt incomplete. That picture didn’t feel so much as half a film. Instead it often felt unnecessary and slowly paced with filler where they didn’t need to be. Mockingjay – Part 1 was light on action and often too grim, dark, and plodding for its own good.
Some of those same tenets hold true for Part 2 (the first hour drags a bit),but this experience feels much more satisfying and sends the franchise off with competence. We pick up where we left off with Lawrence’s Katniss fervently marching towards the Capitol to kill President Snow (Donald Sutherland, still relishing his villainous role). There is still a love triangle between the brainwashed Peeta (Josh Hutcherson, whose acting here is better than we’ve seen before) and hunky Gale (Liam Hemsworth), though we correctly sense how it will turn out eventually. And Katniss is still being used by District 13’s President Coin (Julianne Moore) for propaganda purposes as her motives are constantly in question. The goals of Katniss are undeniably noble while we’re not so sure about the President she’s working for.
Part 2 ups the adventure quotient and director Francis Lawrence is serviceable at delivering these sequences. One in an abandoned subway system with some freaky looking creatures is particularly well-constructed and suspenseful. Yet the real suspense lurks with what Katniss will do once reaches her nemesis President Snow and whether he really is the baddest of the bad guys.
The dynamic between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale has been a running theme throughout these movies. A common complaint has been the underwhelming acting of Hutcherson that sort of makes you root for Gale more than you should. It’s not a notion I disagree with. Here, however, Peeta’s struggle with the mind tricks Snow heaped upon him adds a fascinating dimension. In one segment, he tells Katniss “You should cuff me…” and he means in the literal restraint form with zero shades of grey.
As for various performances, Lawrence again shows she was meant for this role and brings an emotional heft that elevates the material. Moore, Sutherland, and Woody Harrelson as returning mentor Haymitch are all pros. Philip Seymour Hoffman is here in limited screen time, which is probably due to his tragic death nearly two years ago. There are a couple of scenes where he should obviously be in it. Elizabeth Banks is given a couple scenes as franchise favorite Effie.
For the most part, Mockingjay – Part 2 is about getting down to the business of Katniss exacting her revenge. And that thirst for revenge only grows during the fairly well-paced proceedings taking place here. The body count piles up. The stakes grow higher and everything feels urgent in a way that it didn’t and really couldn’t in Part 1. Having never read the Suzanne Collins books which these Games are adapted from, I don’t know about the complaints I’ve picked up about a disappointing ending for the series. The actions of Katniss in the third act worked for me and the action displayed here is pretty good stuff. If there’s a quibble to be had, it’s that the first two Hunger Games films had more of a sense of humor and there was fun to be had. The original actually felt rather fresh and 2013’s Catching Fire brought the series to a creative high. It stands as easily as the finest picture of the quartet. The final two are considerably bleaker in tone, but word is that faithfully follows what Collins brought her readers. As I wrote in my review of Part 1, there’s no actual “hunger games” happening anymore in these last two entries. Thankfully, Part 2 concludes The Hunger Games franchise in a mostly sufficient manner.
The final installment of the wildly popular franchise based on Suzane Collins’s novels hits screens next Friday as The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2 opens. Francis Lawrence returns to direct and Jennifer Lawrence is back leading her impressive cast that includes Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Julianne Moore, Donald Sutherland, Sam Chaflin, Jena Malone, Stanley Tucci, Jeffrey Wright, and Philip Seymour Hoffman (in his final film role). So far, this is getting better reviews than Part 1‘s 65% Rotten Tomatoes score as this stands at 88% currently.
While all entries in this series have made major bucks, it is worth noting that predecessor Mockingjay – Part 1 came in below the first two flicks. Let’s take a trip down box office history lane with this franchise that began in spring 2012:
The Hunger Games
Opening: $152 million with $408 million overall domestic gross
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Opening: $158 million with $424 overall domestic gross
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1
Opening: $121 million with $337 million overall domestic gross
I find it unlikely that the final tale will outdo the first two, but it could edge out Part 1 simply due to the fact that it’s the last one. It has become commonplace for studios to divide a franchise’s finale installment into two parts. We’ve seen it with Harry Potter and Twilight and Lionsgate did just that here (we’ll see this tactic employed again in the future with the Divergent and Avengers series).
My gut tells me this performs similar to what Part 2 of the last Twilight picture accomplished by making about $3-6 million more that what its predecessor debuted to.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2 opening weekend prediction: $124.2 million
Everything is toned down in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 from the makeup and hair of Elizabeth Banks to Woody Harrelson’s alcoholism to, most importantly, the tone of the franchise. Hell, even Stanley Tucci’s flamboyant talk show host seems to have gone all Charlie Rose on us. A lot of the excitement is toned down too. The result is what too often seems like a perfunctory bridging of the gap between Catching Fire and what hopefully will be a rousing conclusion to the blockbuster franchise a year from now. Where that leaves Part 1 is left to be determined by what we get in Part 2. For now, it leaves this particular picture as the weakest of The Hunger Games entries by a somewhat considerable margin.
When we last left Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) in 2013’s superb Catching Fire, her love interest Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) had been captured along with others by the dastardly Capitol, led by President Snow (Donald Sutherland, always oozing appropriate creepiness). The main focus here is Katniss’s efforts to eventually get him back. The question is whether or not Peeta’s mind has been corrupted by his captors. His imprisonment means Gale (Liam Hemsworth), best friend to Katniss, has got a legitimate shot at creating an old fashioned love triangle once again and the pic explores those issues.
We are also treated to the sight of some truly fine actors sitting around a lot talking about politics and rebellion – including returnees Harrelson, Jeffrey Wright, and the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman. They’re all assisting the effort of bringing President Snow’s reign to an end and it’s Julianne Moore as the latest terrific actor joining the club as District 13’s President.
Mockingjay – Part 1, as has been noted by others, doesn’t exactly require The Hunger Games moniker ahead of its title. There are no Hunger Games here and a more accurate title could have been The Propaganda Games. The leaders of District 13 are not shy about using Katniss as their symbol to topple the Snow regime and it even results in video cameramen following her to film her heroic exploits. This leaves our central character conflicted about her desire to free the people against her hope to reunite with Peeta.
Jennifer Lawrence has created a heroine for the movie ages with her performances in this franchise and her strong work doesn’t let up here. She’s not the problem here and neither are the other actors – though I’ve never quite been sold on Hutcherson in his important role. The problem is not Francis Lawrence’s adequate direction, even though the action scenes don’t pop like they did in Catching Fire (there’s also not as many of them).
The issue is the Part 1 behind the title. I suspect there could have been a top-notch two and a half hour feature made from the Mockingjay novel. Lionsgate, for clear financial purposes, chose to divide it into two features (much like the Harry Potter and Twilight franchises before this). Due to that choice, Part 1 feels like a commercially viable stopgap made to monopolize profits.
Don’t get me wrong. If you’re a fan of this series (and I consider myself one), this is obviously required viewing. Yet the level of satisfaction provided here doesn’t match the first two films. It feels like half a movie and it’s about half as entertaining as Catching Fire was last year. Let’s hope that Part 2 provides a main course high on entertainment that could relegate this to “leftovers” status. Sometimes those leftovers are just as good as the main course. Not here despite the best efforts of its star, but you’ll need to get through this to get to the main course.
This Friday, only one new release debuts in the marketplace, but it’s a massive one. Yes, Katniss and company are back in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 and expect a number of 2014’s records to be broken.
For starters, it needs only to top the $100 million earned by Transformers: Age of Extinction to have the largest opening weekend of the year. That should be no problem whatsoever. 2012’s original Games got off to a $152M start while last year’s sequel Catching Fire took in $158M. Additionally, Mockingjay 1 (the part two franchise finale is out next year) is almost certain to eventually gross higher than 2014’s current box office champ, Guardians of the Galaxy, which has earned $330M. Both of Mockingjay‘s predecessors have earned over $400M domestically.
Jennifer Lawrence returns at Katniss with a large ensemble cast including Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Julianne Moore, Donald Sutherland, Elizabeth Banks, Woody Harrelson, Jeffrey Wright, Stanley Tucci, and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. Reviews have been mostly strong, though notices for Catching Fire were more positive.
This third entry appears unlikely to gross under the original’s $152M out of the gate. However, I question whether it manages to top Catching Fire‘s $158M haul. I’ll predict this opens right in the middle of the first two while easily claiming the title of best roll out of the year.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 opening weekend prediction: $155.8 million
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