Book - Movie Adaptation: Mockingjay Part 1 - FTM

Following her rescue from the devastating Quarter Quell, Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) awakes in the complex beneath the supposedly destroyed District 13. Her home, District 12, has been reduced to rubble, and Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) is now the brainwashed captive of President Snow (Donald Sutherland). At the same time, Katniss also learns about a secret rebellion spreading throughout all of Panem -- a rebellion that will place her at the center of a plot to turn the tables on Snow.

- Wikipedia

Going into this movie, I could only hope for great things. The first two were phenomenal so I had my expectations set. To be honest, I did not know what to expect from this movie, the book was my least favourite out of the trilogy and I didn't want it to be the same with the movie.

It's very hard, for me at least to compare this film to the past ones. Each film has something special about them but they do get better and better each time. I love all of them equally but in different ways. Individually, they have there own story even though they are all part of the same franchise but they all set themselves apart from the others. Mockingjay Part 1 shows a more serious side of the franchise and the book. I felt that in the book, we didn't get to feel the seriousness of the whole situation. All of the things that they added to the film added so much more feeling and depth to the story that wasn't really there in the book.

Let me say that I did not feel like I was watching a Hunger Games movie. Everything was so different,  the characters were so broken and damaged and the whole mood of the film was very different from the first two. This movie really showed how much Katniss empowered people and how she gave them hope. It showed how much power her voice had.

We also got more from different characters like Gale, Prim and Effie. Movie gale is quite different from book Gale. In the film, he holds a lot of jealously towards Peeta and his attitude is a little different but I do like how the movie showed how much he cared for Katniss's family and the others as well, those moments were very touching. One of my favourite parts of the movie was seeing more Prim and Effie, I loved how Effie and Haymitch were kind of flirting with each other. In the past movies, we never saw much of Prim but in each film we slowly got more and more of her. I really like Willow Shields as Prim, even though we don't see much of her in the movies she still really portrays Prim in an elegant and sweet way. 

Obviously this movie has a more serious and dark tone. As soon as you start watching it, you can feel it. You can sense that everything is different.

Let's take a moment to discuss Peeta. If you didn't know this, Peeta is one my favourite characters from the series. I kind of have a fictional crush on him so every single time I saw him on the screen getting more beat up, broken and sad it broke my heart. There is a scene where he is being interviewed by Caesar and he is holding a white rose and he says "I wish I could give this to Katniss." Me being me, I get really sad but then I realize that it's a white rose and all I could think of was President Snow. However another one of my favourite scenes was when she was dreaming of Peeta comforting her from her nightmares and I was just like--- FEELS! Speaking of Katniss and Peeta, I love how they included the pearl. That was just a little thing that was mentioned in the books that they put in the movie, I am so glad that they chose to have that in the film because to me, it gave so much more meaning to Katniss and Peeta.

For those of us who have read the books, we all know that Peeta is hijacked. For the whole entire movie I was anticipating that scene where Peeta starts to choke Katniss. That scene was so much more intense than I expected, it was just so real. Also, just seeing him so thin and bruised really scarred me. Also the ending scene though, I mean WHY?!

Also Finnick. Sam Clafin is seriously the perfect Finnick, he portrays him very well. It was so interesting to see this whole other side of Finnick that we never got to see before. I can't even put it into words. He also did a PHENOMENAL  job with his monologue that completely exploited President Snow and the whole truth of how the capitol used him for his body. I'm going to miss Finnick when he dies, and Finnick and Annie! UGH! As far as I saw, I really like Stef Dawson as Annie even though she only said one word multiple times.

How cruel and creepy is President Snow in this film? I applaud Donald Sutherland, I love him as an actor but love and despise him as Snow. He gives off this energy that really creeps me out even though it's a movie.

Also, I was a very big fan of all of the added things in the movie. Obviously the books are only in Katniss's point of view but I always loved how they decided to have different views, especially Snow's. Some things were the Rebels singing the hanging tree along with Katniss, the dam breaking, the execution of the "criminals", the loggers killing the peacekeepers. It was very unique thing to literally show how different districts were rebelling. In the books they are only lightly described we never go to actually see it in the books. 

The propo's were also so thrilling to watch. Jennifer Lawrence did an amazing job showing what Katniss was feeling and what she wanted her message to be.

There was just so many little things in this movie that I loved so much that added something special to the movie.

As I started to read and watch other peoples reviews, at least 45% of the ones that I've seen, all complain that it's being split into two movies. They all say oh they could have smushed it all into one film. I got really annoyed with these comments because, they even say that the Mockingjay book was very rushed and squished into less than 300 pages. The movie being split into two was an excellent choice, that way NOTHING WILL BE SMUSHED INTO ONE THING AND IT WON'T FEEL SO RUSHED! It gives everything so much space for more content, and the movie was far better than the book. I just get frustrated with them because they don't see how and why it was an excellent choice. 

Even though I've read the book before and already knew what was going to happen, I still anticipated and loved every moment. This movie took me on an emotional roller coaster ride, it made me laugh, made me sad and also made me angry. This movie was definitely a step up from Catching Fire. I may have not covered everything that I wanted to say but if you do want to know more, you will have to go inside my brain and read my thoughts because I do not think it is physically possible for me to describe how much I loved this movie. I would rate it a 13 out of 5 stars. See what I did there? 13? No? Okay...

I hope you enjoyed this review! 

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