It is the things we love most that destroy us

If I had to use a single word to describe Mockingjay: Part One, it would be tense.

The opening of the film takes us to the aftermath of District 13's destruction. Katniss has been directly shipped from the games to the underground base where President Coin (Julianne Moore) and Head Gamemaker/rebel commander Plutarch Heavensbee (Philip Seymour Hoffman; R.I.P) recruit her to be the face of the new rebellion. She agrees - on the condition that Coin will pull Peeta and the other tributes out of the Capitol at the earliest opportunity. The remainder of the film revolves around Katniss's role as "The Mockingjay," tracing the impact she spurs in the other districts and in the Capitol.

So, why tense? Humour is offered to us in sparse doses throughout the film. (The Hunger Games movies are not, after all, comedies.) We laugh when Katniss requests that Prim can keep her cat, chortle when the ever-fashionable Effie Trinket complains about having to wear a bland, grey jumpsuit, and smile as we watch Katniss tease her cat with a flashlight.

So, the film does not thrust us into complete darkness. Yet most of Mockingjay: Part One is destruction and dread. Death swamps Katniss as she witnesses the wreckage of District 13 with her own eyes, seeing her home reduced to rubble. We watch her go through anguish as the threat of losing "them both" - Gale and Peeta - becomes increasingly likely towards the end of the film. It's a tense and heavy first half of a movie to watch.

While Mockingjay: Part One concludes with Coin keeping her word, Peeta's return is not quite what Katniss had imagined. We barely get a look at his gaunt, bruised face before he lunges for Katniss's throat and begins what becomes the most chilling scene of the entire film. What more proof is needed of the Capitol's torture tactics once you see how it turns the antithesis of monstrosity - Peeta Mellark - into a monster?



While that remains the most terrifying part of the film, its best scene is, without a doubt, the singing scene. "You want me to sing?" Katniss asks - and off she goes, delivering a rendition of The Hanging Tree that soon morphs into a full-blown choir of rebels who storm the Capitol's dams in a suicide mission to wipe out its electricity; this is how a revolution kicks off! The political roots of the film run deep. Troops keep to their formations in the navy-blue rain, echoing Nazi rigidity and channeling dictatorship vibes. They remind us that the Capitol is unrelenting and headed by the cold and merciless President Snow.

So, the film owes its appeal to its daring themes - but also its characters. Again, Gale emerges as the loyal and stubborn best friend (emphasis on stubborn and friend), Haymitch makes welcome cameos (the sober life does not suit him), doe-eyed Sam Claflin sheds light on the exploits of the Capitol, but of course it is Katniss - or should I say Jennifer Lawrence - who completely robs the spotlight. Katniss is the face of the rebellion just as JLaw is the face of the movie. And, why not? She and Katniss are both bold and unafraid to speak up. (I just wish Katniss wouldn't be so self-effacing.)

Mockingjay: Part One was tense - but it has set the stage for its next half, which I wait for with anticipation.

"We need you to hope again"

PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD

When I announced to my friend a couple months back that a new X-Men film would be coming out, she exclaimed, "another one?!"
I suppose such an outcry is justified, considering how SEVEN X-Men films have been produced in the past 14 years. So why do they keep rolling out?



The opening of X-Men: Days of Future Past is dark and pessimistic. Mutants with a scarred 'M' branded into their foreheads shuffle along a dark corridor to their doom. There is a certain Holocaust overtone to the scene - this is mass slaughter. Patrick Stewart's voice asks, "is the future truly set?"

His question is the undercurrent running throughout the whole movie. Taken back to 1973, a journey facilitated by Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page), Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) has but one task to fulfil: to change the course of the future. He must team up with young Xavier and Eric (James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender) and prevent Mystique from shooting Trask (Peter Dinklage) at the Paris Peace Accords. For Dinklage's murder, contrary to impeding the development of his anti-mutant campaign, rather leads to Mystique's capture and the subsequent exploitation of her DNA to create the mutant-killing Sentinels that wipe out Storm (Halle Berry), Bishop (Omar Sy!!) and indeed the entire mutant race at the very beginning of the film - the 'future.'

Just as how Glee has always been the "Rachel Berry Show," I suppose X-Men is always centered around Logan (I did not just make that comparison) - but the emphasis of this film is undoubtedly placed on the 'younger' generation of mutants; the majority of the actors from First Class reprise their roles. Lucas Till makes a welcome cameo, Nicholas Hoult returns as Beast and of course Jennifer Lawrence takes on the role of Mystique. Yet the true gem of the film is undoubtedly Quicksilver, played by Peter Evans. Unruly, ignorant and capricious, Quicksilver is the key to Eric's prison-break. The best scene in the ENTIRE movie is his single-handed, slow-motion reconstruction of the kitchen so that Xavier, Eric and Wolverine can escape untouched. Jim Croce's Time in a Bottle as the soundtrack to his mischief is just the cherry on top.

Apart from shedding light on new characters, however, Days of Future Past also zooms in on the acute temperaments of its protagonists. When Logan is confronted by a drunken Charles, we get a sense of the utter psychological trauma that followed First Class - Charles is not only obliged to deal with his leg injury but also the heartbreak of losing Mystique and being abandoned by Eric. Eric seems essentially the same man he was before, albeit less preoccupied with the idea of mutant Darwinism. Yet  violence and demonstration remains his key assets: he seems just as ready to kill Mystique as he is to uplift an entire stadium and enforce a siege upon the White House. Somehow, Magneto always turns out to be the antagonist. Thus both Charles and Eric remain ideologically split - the former staunchly believes in appeasement and cooperation whilst the latter gravitates towards the extreme.

The film also offers insights into Mystique's internal struggles and not only those concerning her indecision regarding what she knows she "has to do" and what Charles keeps trying to persuade her to avoid. As in First Class, Mystique struggles with self-identity and image. "Oui, je peux," she responds to the nurse who asks her whether she can imagine waking up to a face "like that." I truly think Jennifer Lawrence leaves a distinct mark in any movie she appears in. It's a magical thing. No wonder everyone in the movie (Eric, Charles, Beast) is in in love with her.

Moreover, X-Men is - as it always has been - visually stunning. I'm not just talking about the effects and the overal grand-scale spectacle - there were so many powerful images in this film. The one that sticks with me the most is perhaps that of Beast hoisted by the metal rings as on public display, his photos snapped as if he were some animal at the zoo. Discrimination and prejudice - are those not still problems we, let alone mutants, continue to face?

Finally, Days of Future Past is ultimately a movie about unity in the face of adversity, and hope - what Xavier calls "the most human power." Beast raises a quantum physics theory about the unalterable nature of time - the current will correct itself no matter how many pebbles are thrown into it, he suggests. But the spirit of hope - the idea that "showing them a better path" can make a difference - is what ultimately leads to the denouement that Logan set out to achieve. Hope is what drives Xavier out of his pity-party and hope is what gives Kitty the willpower to continue facilitating Logan's time travel despite her injury.

Despite the plot turns in the movie, its ending is expected - but not any less satisfying. The scenes of the academy at the end of the movie, complete with Jean, Summer and Rogue, send X-Men fans' minds way back (haha, get it) to 2000, all the way back to X-Men One.

In terms of the final scene of the movie, Stryker's appearance makes sense since his importance was expertly foreshadowed throughout the film. Yet the fact that he is actually Mystique in disguise does seem to suggest a brighter future for Logan and confusingly nullify the contents of X-Men Origins... or does it? Admittedly, Days of Future Past didn't go to great lengths to clarify finer details.

So to respond to the question I posed at the beginning, I suppose the easy answer to why X-Men films keep coming out is that they are lucrative - Hollywood is, after all, a money-sponge to a certain extent. Yet the continued release of these films and their popular reception suggests that there is a 'public demand' element that factors into the making of the X Men films. The actors loves it, the press loves it, WE love it.

Bring on X Men Apocalypse... in 2016!

Remember who the real enemy is

Between the release of The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, Jennifer Lawrence hype boosted exponentially, everyone in the movie seems to have become more attractive and new technology married more honed film direction to deliver - after much anticipation - a satisfying sequel.

By now, Jennifer Lawrence's acting prowess is near-indisputable, Stanley Tucci's bleached teeth and infectious chortle are delightable, and newcomer Sam Claflin (who has come a long way since playing bullied-by-Captain Sparrow Philip Swift), nailing Finnick, is a welcome embellishment to the film.

Jena Malone is also - no other word for it - awesome.

Catching fire confirms that - as Haymitch puts it - "no one ever wins the Hunger Games." Like shell-shocked veterans, both Katniss and Peeta spend the first 1/2 in the shadow of their 'victory' and the bleak darkness of district 12. Both want as much distance between them and the Games as possible but facing the Victors' Tour, they are ushered back into their roles as contrived lovers (oh, the heartbreak in Peeta's eyes).

Yet something is happening in the districts - the people, having seen a scratch on the Capitol's armour, are rioting. Peeta, Katniss, the trick with the berries and the mockingjay, the very symbol of Capitol failure and the power of a simple presence, are spurring revolution against the bombast of Capitol opulence. Even - as the denouement of the Quarter Quell reveals - moles within the Capitol itself are bending the Games itself. In a world still not immune to censorship or war, the Hunger Games is an important film about survival - not only literal survival in the fight-to-death Hunger Games against other  contestants (mere temporary enemies) but also perseverance under government repression, the real enemy.

It's a shame Peeta always seems to be overshadowed (maybe because Josh Hutcherson is short?) although he'll definitely receive more screen time in the final installation, which is in two parts. This film was long, too, around two hours! It would have still achieved impact with concision. [tangent] Why are movies getting longer, pools of resources going into movie-making, and pages of tabloids examining the details of celebrities down to each exacting detail? Entertainment has never been so accessible and desirable. [end of tangent]

When I first read Suzanne Collin's Catching Fire, I was Jonas-brother-loving, innocuous to the hardships of IB life and just getting over my Edward Cullen-phase (about to embark on the Peeta Mellark one, in fact). 2 SAT exams (never again) and a hundred+ books later, much has changed but the pleasure of watching a great, action-packed movie - despite reconfirming throughout that I would never, ever survive the Hunger Games - remains the same.

On a final note:
The repeat counter on listenonrepeat.com is telling me I've been listening to this around 30+ times now.