Hunger Pains

Since we met, my wife and I have enjoyed going to the theater to see films together.  We’ve probably seen somewhere around a couple hundred films in the theater over the past 14 years.  Living in Bowling Green, Ohio, for the past several years has contributed mightily to that, since the Cinemark here in town at the Woodland Mall – both affectionately and mockingly known by BG locals as “The Small” – has to be one of the best deals for seeing new films in the theater in the country.

One Friday this past April (April 6, to be exact), my wife and I decided to go to the theater, and we settled on The Hunger Games as our choice.  We both sat squarely on the fence about whether to see the film or not.  Neither of us was against seeing it, but neither of us expressed a particular interest in hurrying out to it either.  Neither of us had read the books, but we both had heard of The Hunger Games as a popular culture phenomenon.  Nothing else of greater interest was showing, though, so we went to see The Hunger Games.

And I was blown away.  I loved it.  I left the theater saying that, even though blockbusters and Academy Award nominations don’t typically go hand in hand, this deserved merit for the Oscars, and a number of its actors, especially Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen for Best Actress, deserved nominations as well.  I also talked about how much I enjoyed seeing a strong female lead character in this film—something I made sure to bring up in the Communication and Gender class I was teaching the following Monday.

Within days, I had purchased the novel on my Kindle and was devouring it, followed quickly by its sequels, Catching Fire and Mockingjay.  I continued to be enthralled, and the more I read the books, the more I was convinced of their value, not only because of the strong female lead character, but also because they seemed like an outstanding set of narratives for illustrating standpoint theory—a theory that suggests that one’s positions in power structures within a society affect one’s viewpoints, attitudes, expectations, interests, and so on.  Standpoint theory plays a large role when I teach Communication and Gender as well as when I teach a course on Communication, Race, and Power, which I was also teaching in the spring, and so the articulation of this theory in these books came along for me at a time when they resonated profoundly with the content in the courses I was teaching.  I took time in each course to talk about this connection. 

The first book in the series clearly seems to be the best, and the third book – Mockingjay – did contain a few parts that felt a bit contrived, but I found great value in the entire series.  The series demonstrates the aforementioned connection to standpoint theory as we see Katniss learn to understand how different people who have experienced different forms and levels of privilege come to very different ways of making sense out of life.  The hope is, of course, that as we read about Katniss’ experiences, we learn to apply this to our own lives and interactions with others as well.  At least, that’s the connection I saw to the Communication and Gender and Communication, Race, and Power classes. 

In the process, though, the books also demonstrate how hegemony works, and with the “Hunger Games” competition, the narrative seems to serve as an excellent metaphor for discussing and understanding how forms of oppression and dehumanization occur within competitive systems like capitalism.

The third book adds another important element to that, as it demonstrates how resistance movements can often end up investing in their own forms of oppression and dehumanization.  In particular, the resistance movement in this book seems to provide an excellent depiction of how socialist movements such as those that have developed in the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba can be little or no better at avoiding oppression and dehumanization than the competitive capitalist systems that they oppose.  The series, as a whole, thus invites both reflection on how to recognize the oppressive and inhumane aspects of both systems and discussion of how we might chart a course that provides a more humane alternative to these two options that have so pervasively dominated the modern world.

Meanwhile, the third book also includes the very important narrative element that provides the basis for the overall story’s literary irony.

Given all of this, I have been greatly looking forward to the theatrical versions of Catching Fire and Mockingjay.  However, some very recent news has dampened that enthusiasm considerably.

This week, Lionsgate Entertainment announced that the third book, Mockingjay, will be split into two films, continuing a trend that started with the seventh book in the Harry Potter series, which was cut into two films that were released in November 2010 and July 2011, respectively.  That cut made some sense.  Many Harry Potter fans with whom I’ve talked have tended to feel that the film versions of books four, five, and six left too much out.  The seventh book is no less densely packed, and so significant of an amount of narrative elements needed resolution in the seventh Harry Potter book that, while still debatable, I think a case can be made for justifying splitting the final book into two films.

Not justifiable, though, is the trend that this has begun.  Soon after film studios realized the increased profitability of having two films for one Harry Potter book, other franchises began to follow suit.  The fourth book in the Twilight series was split into two books, and as someone who has read all of the books and seen all of the films, I can state quite firmly that I do not believe that Breaking Dawn contains the kinds of narrative complexity that warrant two films.  Additionally, while each of the books from the The Lord of the Rings trilogy warranted its own book, largely because they are their own books to begin with, I do not think that The Hobbit needs to be broken into two films.  Indeed, it’s already been done as one (albeit animated) film before.  And, similarly, for all of its merits within the The Hunger Games series, Mockingjay does not seem worthy of two films.  Quite the opposite, I fear that two films, by both drawing out the narrative to a point of lost efficacy and, particularly, by splitting the narrative in two separate experiences, have the capacity to diminish the strength of the book’s narrative themes and resonances.

This is, though, as so many folks have already realized, a rather bald play for profit by film production studios.  They can make much more money by asking filmgoers to attend two films, asking consumers to purchase two films, and so on than they can by just having one film.  And, of course, they’re relying on the premise that fans like me who really enjoyed the book series and the first film, along with the regular blockbuster-attending public, will pay for a second set of tickets, a second DVD or digital download, and so on.

When, though, is enough enough?  Supposed “news” sources often report on ways in which Hollywood loses money.  Every time we witness a few weeks in which the films in theaters didn’t rake in as much money as the films in theaters on corresponding weeks one year before, we’re inevitably treated to stories about Hollywood being in “a slump.”  Forget any other complicating factors, like how the summer blockbuster planned for exactly one year after a film like The Dark Knight, Avatar, Spider-Man, or any of the other top 20 pictures of all time would be hard-pressed to repeat the success of their predecessors from one year earlier.  Forget that 14 of the top 20 highest-grossing films of all time in the United States have come out in the last 10 years and that three of the top five have come out in the last five years.  Forget that even in a down week, especially during the summer and between Thanksgiving and Christmas, movie theaters bring in tons of money every week.  And forget all of the other ways in which Hollywood has figured out how to make money beyond theater ticket sales.  Hollywood production studios, and their parent companies, would continually like you to believe that they are facing pending economic collapse.  The news agencies that report this, which are owned by those same parent companies as the film production studios, are complicit in this ploy as they report this.  And, in the end, they’re banking on the consuming public paying for all of this, like the folks in Capital City, needing diversions to make our lives meaningful while the economic system that produces those diversions continues its various forms of oppression and dehumanization, often without our awareness or our concern. 

In the end, it’s tough to say what is enough, and that’s a question that folks like me who study popular culture usually have to negotiate as we both find pleasure in popular culture and critique it at the same.  It’s a question that many courses I teach, many conversations I have, many written works that I publish, and this blog seek to ask more folks to realize and explore.  It may be that I have already bought too much into the ploy by seeing films in theaters, by buying the The Hunger Games books, by purchasing soundtracks for some films I see, and so on.  Having a local film theater that only charges a few bucks to see a newly released film makes it a little easier for me to justify going to the movies, but it still exists within that negotiation process, and that my available choice involves simply how much money I will spend to see a film in a theater demonstrates some of the privileges I already enjoy that many do not.  And, in the end, as much as it pains me to say it, the splitting of Mockingjay into two films may have to be the line I cannot cross.  I’m anxious to see the cinematic representation of the novel, but I think in the end I’m more anxious not to contribute to what seems to be an embodiment by Lionsgate of the very antithesis of the useful critical theme that drew me to the books in the first place.