Capitol Couture

I suppose I should think about reading Catching Fire, finally, hmm?

You can view the rest of the Capitol portraits at Capitol Couture.

The Hunger Games

I took the afternoon off today and finally went to see The Hunger Games. After finishing the novel (my review), I wasn't quite ready to rush to the theater -- I needed to "sit" on the story for a few days. I'm glad I waited -- this movie was a powerful book-to-screen adaptation, probably one of the best -- in that it is so faithful to the source material -- adaptations that I've ever seen. I suppose that is what you get when the author has a background in screenwriting and helps craft the screenplay (WIN). I'm not interested in rehashing the plot -- if you're unfamiliar with that you can check out my review. But there are points that I want to discuss, so let's go...

First of all, I LOVED the look of District 12. It's described as what once was Appalachia, remote, mountain living -- but Collins's prose is so terse, so matter-of-fact not a lot of time is spent dwelling on Katniss's home (it's just taken as a matter of fact). In the world of the film, District 12 is very Depression-era Appalachia, a bleak, rough existence. Evoking the feel of 1930s-era history is brilliant, a perfect fit for the hardscrabble, coal-mining existence that Katniss hails from. And when we're introduced to the gaudy, colorful world of the Capitol, the differences are so stark as to be horribly jarring. The line of demarcation between the haves of the Capitol and the have nots of District 12 was almost nauseating in a way.

I was incredibly impressed with Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss. I've only seen her previously in X-Men: First Class (where she played the young Mystique). At only twenty-one, Lawrence has an assurance and screen presence far beyond her years. In the novel we have the luxury of being completely immersed in Katniss's thoughts and feelings, thanks to the first-person narration. I found Lawrence to be more than up for the challenge of conveying the full scope of Katniss's emotions -- her determination, fear, uncertainty, and anger. And I love the fact that she isn't your typical stick-thin starlet. Physically she was completely believe able for me -- this was a girl at home in the woods, a huntress. Lawrence can be a very expressive actress, and at her age, with the screen presence she has now -- wow, talk about a bright future.

I should probably mention Gale (Liam Hemsworth). Now I've only read the first book, so I don't even understand how there can be such a thing as "Team Gale." So for a character I was already relatively ambiguous about, Hemsworth got the job done. Though I have to say it was rather jarring seeing him without his trademark blonde hair. Oh, one development I did like as far as Gale goes in this film is that we see his troubled reaction to watching the Katniss/Peeta relationship play out during the games, something not possible in the novel.

Now that I've got that Gale person out of the way, I can talk about Peeta. I was a little concerned based on the brief glimpses of Peeta in the previews that Josh Hutcherson would come across as a little too...wooden, I think is the word I'm looking for. I was pleasantly surprised to have my fears proven groundless. Through his performance, Hutcherson grows Peeta from the baker's son, almost shell-shocked at being chosen during the Reaping, to a charismatic, engaging and most importantly, in love, youth on the verge of losing the girl he loves to the Games. I've read several reviews that feel the Katniss/Peeta screen relationship was lacking. Now while I would've always loved to see more of their slow-burning relationship, what we're given on-screen worked extraordinarily well for me. The film allows us to see Katniss's gradually dawning realization that for some reason beyond her comprehension, particularly in the context of the horrible situation they're in, Peeta matters. And Peeta quite frankly adores her, a fact that Hutcherson conveys extraordinarily well.

District 12's Games organizer is the garish Effie Banks, and Elizabeth Banks does a terrific job portraying all of her absurd extremes. And her clothes -- oh they were fantastically realized. I love love loved Lenny Kravitz as the designer Cinna (gold eyeliner and all). He was grounded, as compassionate as can be given the situation -- I was quite happy with the film's delivery of the Cinna/Katniss friendship. And his costumes were extraordinary -- girl on fire, indeed. But even more interesting to me, though, was Woody Harrelson's performance as 12's sole previous victor, the drunken Haymitch. I really liked Harrelson's performance -- in the novel, Katniss is frustrated or hostile to Haymitch much of the time, so I had a hard time getting a good sense of his character, his thoughts and perspective. And Harrelson riddles Haymitch with self-loathing, a quality he gradually puts aside as the realization that he might actually be able to save Katniss and Peeta penetrates his alcohol-clouded brain. At least that's how it hit me.

EDIT: I can't believe I forgot to mention Stanley Tucci's performance as Caesar Flickerman, the interviewer and Games commentator. His mannerisms, his blue hair -- oh he was hilarious, and pretty much pitch-perfect for the role. The periodic commentary he shared with Toby Jones as Claudius Templesmith was yet another way the filmmakers took the narrative outside of Katniss's head and let us see the Games from the outside in, as it were.

Witnessing Haymitch's behind-the-scenes efforts on behalf of his tributes was one of the "added" scenes in the film, things Katniss could never know because she was locked in the arena. Frankly I thought peeking "behind the curtain" into the making and running of the Games was really pretty fascinating, and for me it succeeded in making the awful horror of the event more impactful, because of the clinical, calculated manner in which the Games are staged. Since I have yet to read Catching Fire, without giving away too many spoilers is the Gamemaker Seneca Crane (Wes Bentley -- WHAT A BEARD) introduced? I can't remember him being mentioned by name at all. Anyways -- I thought Crane's added scenes with President Snow (Donald Sutherland) were really well-done, particularly his realization at the end of the film that he isn't above being a pawn in the Capitol's plans any more than tributes. I also assume that Snow becomes a much bigger player in the second and third novels -- thanks to Sutherland's performance I already hate him. Sutherland was chilling.

I've touched on the development of the Peeta/Katniss relationship in the arena. The second most important event, to my mind anyway, is Katniss's friendship with the District 11 girl tribute Rue (Amandla Stenberg). Stenberg was SO GOOD, the ideal actress to bring Rue's vulnerability to life. Stenberg and Lawrence's scenes broke my heart, particularly her death and Katniss's reaction -- Lawrence's grief was wholly believable and gut-wrenching. Question, to those who've read the books -- is it revealed that Katniss's care for Rue after her death sparks a riot in District 11? Irregardless I thought that was a powerful scene to include in the film, in how it suggests that Katniss (and later Peeta) fan the flames of discontent in the districts.

At the moment I really can't think of another film that was guaranteed blockbuster status that was filmed without much of the gloss and glamour you expect from Hollywood. Director Gary Ross and his team have imbued every aspect of this film with a sense of gritty realism and authenticity, helped by a lot of handheld camera work that adds urgency and energy to sequences, visually mimicking Collins's high-energy prose. Even the film's score (provided by James Newton Howard) eschews the tendency of blockbusters-in-the-making to go for loud and bombastic. The cues evoking the mountainous, folk music traditions of Katniss's home are gorgeous, a stark contrast to the dangers facing her and Peeta in the arena. Like the novel, watching The Hunger Games is an unsettling experience -- I think the film hit me even a tick harder than the  book did, which I thought was an interesting and honestly somewhat unexpected reaction. It isn't the level of violence -- that's certainly there, but honestly there could have been more, all things considered. I think being outside of Katniss's head, seeing her in this unfathomable situation, seeing the people gleefully betting on a tribute's odds in the Capitol, seeing the Gamemaker's employees clinically raining horror down on the heads of survivors in the arena -- seeing all of this drove home the novel's ripping condemnation of our voyeuristic, desensitized society in a fresh, powerful manner.

The Hunger Games is really an extraordinarily well-done adaptation, a prime example, I think, of thoughtful filmmaking. This is a team that cares about the source material, and I dearly hope they carry this passion through to the sequels. I feel like this post only touches on what I could say about this film, what worked, what was changed -- but that would require more thought (and most likely additional viewings). However, if there's anything I haven't touched on (I try so hard to be thorough, ha!) that you'd like to try and discuss please feel free to mention that in the comments.

X-Men: First Class

As promised, I saw X-Men: First Class yesterday with Kaye and Liz, and I am happy to report this movie lived up to my ridiculously high expectations. It was all about Fassbender, and since I was all about Fassbender, that's pretty much a recipe for cinematic bliss.

I'm strictly an X-Men movie fan, so I have no real grasp of the group's comic book lore - and frankly, any time I have looked up a film character and started reading about their comic book counterpart's history, I just end up getting confused. So, going into First Class, I was particularly interested in seeing how characters like Magneto, Professor X, and Mystique got their start - and what events happened that set them on the paths we see in X-Men, X2, and X-Men: The Last Stand.

First Class opens with an excellent recreation of the concentration camp scene from the first X-Men, where a young Erik (Bill Milner) reveals his ability to control metal with his mind. The re-created scene is expanded with a brief shot introducing the evil scientist, Sebastian Shaw (a scene-stealing Kevin Bacon), who wants to exploit Erik's abilities. In the previous film, it was left to the imagination what horrors Erik endured in the camps, but now we witness his terror when he can't "perform" his metal trick on command, leading to his mother's murder, and the subsequent mental abuse and manipulation that's inflicted on his mind by a repulsively giddy Shaw. Raised to believe he's the only one of his kind, after the war (when Erik-as-Michael Fassbender comes on the scene) Erik makes it his mission to hunt down and destroy the monsters who wrecked his life, particularly Shaw. In a way, Erik's twisted father/son/creator/experiment relationship with Shaw mirrors Wolverine's history with Stryker. Both mutants suffered horribly at the hands of men who wanted to control and manipulate their powers and abilities, and both are faced with a choice of how they allow their pasts to influence their futures.

Charles Xavier's (James McAvoy) beginnings stand in sharp contrast to Erik's - raised in the comfort of wealth and privilege, Charles goes on to university and makes a name for himself studying human genetic mutation. His childhood friend Raven (Jennifer Lawrence) is the only one who knows he's a telepath. This close history between Charles and Raven, a.k.a. Mystique, is a fascinating beginning for these two characters, given their later film history as passionate rivals on opposite sides of the mutant vs. human debate. Now, I love James McAvoy, but frankly he stood no chance of standing up to Fassbender's on-screen magnetism (no character pun intended). He was a good choice to play the high-minded idealist to Erik's hardened survival-minded pragmatism. And his delivery of mutant-themed pick-up lines was hilarious.

For someone like Charles whose as interested in helping mutants cope in society, at this point in his life it's interesting to see how even he exhibited a distinct lack of understanding toward mutants like Mystique whose abilities resulted in physical "abnormalities" instead of strictly internal mutations like his own telepathy. Now, I'm not familiar with Lawrence's previous film work, but I thought she did a fantastic job as the young Raven - she's completely believable as a young woman who simply wants to fit in, and struggles with the blue skin and scales that are exhibited when her mutation is fully exhibited. Raven is super-sweet here, but hurt and frustrated enough with Charles's (her first crush?) inability to accept her atypical beauty that the progression to the hardened, human-hating warrior Mystique later becomes is an understandbly slippery slope. I thought the set-up for Raven's fascination with Erik was extremely well-played. Given his history, Erik whole-heartedly affirms Raven's mutation as her own brand of unique beauty - and with lines like that delivered by a mesmerizing guy with Fassbender's looks, Raven's fascination with Erik is easy to understand.

Speaking of Erik, he is the linchpin on which the entire film rests, and Fassbender carries the burden with a debonair, dangerous sort of grace. As my friend Rachel so astutely pointed out on Facebook, when you think about it, Magneto is really just the Rochester of the mutant world - and I couldn't agree more. Erik is the character I long to see redeemed and understood. I want him to find peace, to let go of his rage and channel that into building a future for himself instead of allowing his past to define his future. Fassbender gives Erik a breath-taking intensity and focus, whenever he's on-screen that is where your focus will lie. Since I love studying World War II-era history, I thought the scenes prior to Erik and Charles's meeting were especially fascinating. The man was a one-man crew bent on hunting down the Nazis who destroyed his family and delivering his own special brand of justice. And not that I'm an advocate of vigilantism, but I'm not gonna lie, I loved watching Erik's quest.

There's this brief shining moment, when Erik finds a friend in Charles, that a part of me wished that the subsequent X-Men films hadn't been made yet - that we have this whole glorious history of their friendship to watch unfold, with no predetermined end in sight. Fassbender and McAvoy have a wonderful on-screen chemistry together. Two sides of the same coin, Erik is the lean and hunger tiger, poised to pounce, while Charles is the calmer, more measured - but equally passionate - flip side. When they're both on the same page, recruiting mutants for a cover CIA op, that was so much fun. Those scenes were great little snapshots of the whole movie's "swinging sixties" vibe. Erik and Charles, on a mission to change the world, the future wide open with limitless possibilities - and Fassbender allows Erik to look completely happy and at ease for the first time in the movie, which will drive you nuts if you let it when you start thinking about Magneto's future.

I read a couple of reviews that likened the feel of this movie to a Sean Connery-era James Bond caper - and that description is completely right on the money. Director Matthew Vaughn delivers a wildly entertaining, globe-spanning adventure, and in the best Bond tradition the action spans the globe, from France to Argentina (didn't Fassbender look divine in white? *g*) to Las Vegas. With colorful, exotic locales, a few instances of women dressed in their best go-go girls "outfits," Vaughn tops it all off by resurrecting the Russians, a sixties-era tried-and-true villain. *wink* As Shaw, Kevin Bacon positively chews the scenery in the best Ernst Blofeld villain tradition, complete with a luxury ship (rather reminscent of Thunderball). There's even the requisite, loves to show off her cleavage female sidekick, Emma Frost, played by the horribly HORRIBLY cast January Jones. Now, I get that a character named Frost, whose mutant ability is transforming into a living diamond, is supposed to have a sort of "ice queen" vibe, but Jones just comes off as so vapid. I definitely preferred the Emma Frost we briefly met in Wolverine (that was one of the more interesting jumps in continuity IMO).

Another interesting continuity jump involves the character of Moira MacTaggart, here played by Rose Byrne and introduced as a potential love interest for Charles. In The Last Stand, Taggart is briefly introduced as an actual doctor and long-time colleage of Xavier's, played by Olivia Williams. So, that was an interesting career change. *wink* I thought Byrne's chemistory with McAvoy was pretty non-existent, but she did the whole passionate advocate for mutants with the CIA thing fairly well. And I did love the scene at the end of the film, where she promises Charles that she'll never reveal the location of his school - and in a moment of heart-rending nobility like only James McAvoy can play, Charles wipes her memory. Poor woman, never to kiss McAvoy again? Tragic.

While this movie was all about Erik (thank you Fassbender), with Xavier a distant second, I want to mention a few other mutants. Jason Flemyng, my darling Danny in Primeval, plays the evil, demon-like shapeshifter Azazel. And while it was great to see a favorite on the big screen, am I ever going to get the chance to see Flemyng play a marginally (at least) heroic character in a big-screen flick? Please? :) On the side of the good guys, I really enjoyed Caleb Landry Jones's role as Sean Cassidy/Banshee, but I have to ask, was anyone else completely distracted by the guy's uncanny resemblance to Rupert Grint and the Weasleys?! Somebody call Mr. Weasley, I've found his missing American son.

Nicholas Hoult was fantastic as Hank McCoy/Beast. His early crush on Raven is adorable, and his result of his well-intentioned efforts to "cure" his early mutation (just big animal-like feet), is really quite wrenching to witness. Hoult, I think, bears an uncanny resemblance to James Marsden, the later screen incarnation of Scott Summers/Cyclops. He really could be Marsden's younger brother at the least, especially when you first meet Scott in X-Men. Hoult's similarity to Marsden distracted me from Lucas Till as Alex Summers/Havok - who, if the film keeps up with comic book lore, is actually Scott's brother (the two can generate the same type of destructive, laser-like power). Oh, I though he's not a mutant, I can't forget to mention how much fun it was to see Oliver Platt, one of the CIA suits whose expertise happens to be mutant research.

I absolutely loved the way the climax of the film is set around the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. Tying a super hero movie into a real-world historical event like that is just rife with fascinating possibilities, and this movie delivers with explosions and destroyed subs and barely averted war galore. And John F. Kennedy acquitted himself really well in this movie, I've got to say. *wink*

The emotional heart of the climax is when Erik goes after Shaw - did their confrontation remind anyone but me of Luke and Vader in The Empire Strikes Back? Or am I just that geeky of a fangirl? (I'm guessing the latter, but I thought I'd ask anyway.) :) I was half expecting Shaw to go all "Erik, I am you father!" Anyways, Star Wars references aside, I thought Fassbender played Erik's turmoil during this sequence brilliantly. Up to this point he's been on Charles's side, and while there's genuine friendship and camraderie between them, Fassbender always has Erik hold something in reserve. That something is what's unleashed when he shuts Xavier out and kills Shaw. The irony of this all is that while he rejects Charles's worldview, it's only thanks to his friend's help that he's finally able to control his power and become the focused, driven Magneto we know from the later films.

Now, I understand in the comics Xavier becomes crippled in a fight with an alien. However, First Class suggests an alternate origin for Xavier's injury, one rich with implications for the Xavier/Erik friendship. When Erik goes completely out of control and attempts to kill the Russian and American soldiers, Moira tries to shoot him. Erik deflects the bullets and one strikes Charles, severing his spine. Having Erik responsible for crippling his only friend, the one who knows his darkest secrets and deepest fears is heart-breaking. It adds whole new layers of depth to the relationship we see between the older Charles and Magneto. The history and experiences the two share in this film, and the genuineness and depth of their friendship, is gloriously well-played by Fassbender and McAvoy. I absolutely loved seeing the bond of friendship develop between Charles and Erik, and I really think only actors of Fassbender and McAvoy's caliber could sell the connection between them, make a friendship and understanding that transcends such polar-oppsite worldviews heartbreakingly believable.

X-Men: First Class is top-notch entertainment from start to finish. Vaughn directs the scene changes and large cast with aplomb, and makes one care (or revile, depending on their personality) about each character. Henry Jackman delivers a rousing score that does a decent job of echoing the slickly produced sixties action pictures that this movie owes so much to in tone and style. I desperately hope Vaughn & company get to make a sequel to First Class - this set-up and core cast have so much possibility. And yes, I confess, I want further opportunity to see Fassbender put his unique spin on the Magneto character. He owns this movie, and his tour-de-force performance as the tortured Erik deserves a second outing. Pretty please?

So...I'll end this ridiculously long post with a few gratuitious Michael Fassbender-as-Erik pictures, because I can. :)

Oh, yes, that's nice. Very nice. :)

So, if you've seen First Class I'd love to hear your thoughts - and if you're not an X-Men fan, might I suggest this is an excellent place to start?