The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1

[assydingo]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

In a strange way, no. I don't mean that I don't want to see Part 2 next year, I mean that the movie was satisfying enough in narrative terms that I'm not jonesing for another instalment right this second. (Having read the book for the umpteenth time also helps.)

So much of the complaining I've heard about this movie is that it's only the first part, nothing interesting happens, all Lawrence does is cry, it's really dull visually blah blah ****ing blah. But the movie's narrative is plenty satisfying in and of itself, there's some well-executed (pun not intended) action, Lawrence is superb as usual and Francis Lawrence's direction is very good indeed. (I know, right?)

I got chills when Katniss surveys the hospital building and all the people do the three-fingered salute, the "if we burn" propo also gave me the shivers and when SPOILERS FOR PART 2

[Show spoiler]Prim mentions she's in training to be a doctor I actually welled up with a few tears, knowing what's to come in Part 2. That movie's gonna be so ****ing heartbreaking.

It's as good a part 1 as I'd dared hope. It's not perfect as I missed a lot of the nuances from the book which were left out, and what was with the music? Half of it seemed like it'd been tracked in from Catching Fire. (Hanging Tree was awesome though, I can't stop humming that tune.) But overall it's a worthy 8/10.

Yeah I cried during the hospital scene. My eyes may have welled up at other parts too.

[Show spoiler]Love Prim but didn't cry about her yet though I probably will in the next movie.

For me the movie was more enjoyable than the book. While reading the third book I kept thinking it'd work better as a movie and it does.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by Pounder

I like that gif. In the words of MBF:"I Will save it for later"

ha, ha.

[Holmes]

The penultimate episode of the Hunger Games franchise is a decidedly dull and uninteresting film. It is an exhausting experience, a lumbering beast of a stopgap with a tendency to repeat itself and an aversion to momentum. A real step down from the exuberance and high-toned craftsmanship of the prior film, Catching Fire. Part of the problem is the foregrounding of one of the least sexy, least engaging love triangles in recent memory. I believe the name Gale is District 12 lingo for "Who the **** cares?" And the other one is just bread. The film's ideas regarding revolutionary propaganda are briefly amusing, but stretched deadly thin when forced to function as the main storyline. Action sequences (a highlight of Catching Fire) are well-shot, but few and far between, and the poorly ventilated and under-lit rebel compound where much of the film transpires started to seem a symbol of the crowded, slightly hot auditorium in which I found myself imprisoned watching this.

Jennifer Lawrence acts her heart out (cry! cry harder!), but her character, Katniss, is not as engaging this time out, in my opinion. Our resourceful, quietly conflicted heroine has become a bit of an indecisive sap, and I found this transition abrupt and confusing, though I have not watched Catching Fire in a year and have never read the novels. The older pros and veterans of the cast largely turn in capable performances as far as they go, though Woody Harrelson might as well have stayed in bed. Julianne Moore nicely conveys guarded benevolence, and, on the flip side of the presidential coin, Donald Sutherland once again exudes austere malevolence. And it is poignant to see the late Philip Seymour Hoffman in one of his final roles, even if this is hardly a challenging part for such a masterful thespian; he seems amused and detached throughout, as if slightly floating above the proceedings, albeit in a jovial way.

C

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Friday Box Office: The 'Mockingjay' Soars Above $400M Worldwide

Friday was the day when The Hunger Games: Mockingjay part I stopped needing to have its box office totals defended, as the Jennifer Lawrence action drama bounced back in a huge way on Black Friday with a $24.4 million gross. That was a massive 121% from Thursday and it is a Friday-of-Thanksgiving number that towers over the various Black Friday earnings of the Twilight films and the respective Harry Potter films. In fact, it’s the third biggest Black Friday gross ever behind Hunger Games: Catching Fire ($30m) and Frozen ($26m) both from last year. The size of the Friday number, coupled with the somewhat smaller Thanksgiving Day gross, which were huge but more in line with a Harry Potter sequel, shows that Katniss has (comparably) started acting like Katniss again at least for a few days. The Hunger Games is pulling a Phantom Menace, casting off doubts over a smaller-than-expected debut with a stronger-than-expected second weekend.

Harry Potter 7.1 earned $20m on its Black Friday back in 2010 while Harry Potter parts 1 and 4 both earned around $22m for their respective Black Friday grosses. As you recall, Mockingjay part I opened with $121m last weekend, easily the biggest debut of 2014 but somewhat down from the $152m debut of The Hunger Games and the $158m opening weekend of Catching Fire. With this robust Friday gross, it looks like Mockingjay part I should earn around $58 million for the Fri-Sun frame (-52% from last weekend), which is a slightly smaller drop than Catching Fire and pretty much the same second weekend as The Hunger Games scored in March of 2012. It will also be the third-biggest Fri-Sun Thanksgiving frame behind Catching Fire ($74m) and Frozen ($67m). It should earn around $83m for the holiday frame, again the third-largest Thanksgiving weekend behind Catching Fire ($109m) and Frozen ($93m).

The film should cross $200m domestic today and should now, if the pattern holds, end its tenth day with $227m, which is close enough to The Hunger Games‘s $248m ten-day cume to give hope for decent holiday legs. I now have no idea how well the film will hold up over the next month, although it has smooth sailing until Exodus drops on December 12th. The film is doing quite well overseas and has crossed $400 million worldwide as of yesterday. It may well trump the $440m that Catching Fire earned overseas, as it’s still outpacing it and should end up close to $500m worldwide tomorrow or Monday.

But even if it doesn’t, a $400m overseas total and a $300m domestic cume would still mean $700m worldwide for this third Hunger Games film. Is that a comedown for the franchise compared with the $861m earned by Catching Fire? Sure, but there is only one installment left and frankly 95% of any and all other franchises or would-be event films would be (to paraphrase James Cameron) soiling themselves with fecal matter while their mouths stood agape. This third installment, which was mostly foreplay with little pay-off, was always going to be the runt of the litter. I presume this will kick back into “normal” next year when the franchise reaches its bitter end.

The big new opener of the weekend was Penguins of Madagascar from DreamWorks Animation DWA -0.08%. Since DreamWorks had a prior animated feature drop two Thanksgivings ago, the comparisons are pretty easy on this one. Rise of the Guardians opened with $4.8 million on its first Wednesday and went on to earn $32m over the holiday. Penguins of Madagascar, which by-the-by was a lot cheaper ($132m) than the ambitious fantasy adventure, opened on Wednesday with $6.25m and followed that up with a $3.95m Thanksgiving Day haul. The Penguins of Madagascar shot up 165% from Thursday to Friday, earning $10.5m on Black Friday, bringing its cume to $20.7m. That puts it in a position to earn around $38m for the holiday frame.

It’s not a super-duper opening, especially with DreamWorks being watched on all sides as they end their 20th anniversary year in a precarious position. Nonetheless, this one is going to do well overseas, they didn’t set the second act in Shanghai for fun, and it’s the kind of “no harm, no foul” babysitter title that will play well on DVD/VOD for years. Walt Disney’s Big Hero 6 is still playing quite strong, which I imagine isn’t helping the situation either. I wish it were a better movie and as a fan of the company I wish it were playing a little better, but let’s see how it holds up against the onslaught of live-action family titles (Into the Woods, Annie, Night at the Museum 3, etc.) next month before I cast too much judgment. The trailer for Home looks pretty delightful and I wouldn’t be surprised if it clicked in a big way next year.

The other new wide release was Horrible Bosses 2 (Mark Hughes’s very negative review), which opened on Wednesday with $4.25 million, $3.06m on Thanksgiving Day, and now $6.2m on Black Friday The New Line Cinema/Warner Bros. (Time Warner TWX +1.59% Inc.) sequel has earned $13.51m thus far and is on pace to earn around $23m over the long holiday frame, which is noticeably less than the $28m that the first film earned over its initial Fri-Sun frame in July of 2011. I thought the number would be a little higher going into the first two days, but them’s the breaks for a sequel that no one really asked for that is getting dreadful reviews. The sequel, which brings back pretty much everyone from the first film (Jason Bateman Charlie Day Jason Sudeikis Jennifer Aniston Kevin Spacey, and Jamie Foxx) and brings aboard Christoph Waltz and Chris Pine, cost just $43m to produce (compared to $37m for the original), so even a total well below the original’s $209m worldwide cume will be a win for this film.

The Imitation Game was the big limited debut this weekend, as Weinstein Company’s Oscar-contender drama about Alan Turing earned $181,130 for four theaters on its opening Friday. It’s setting itself up for a monstrous $122k per-screen average by tomorrow, the second largest of the year behind The Grand Budapest Hotel. The Benedict Cumberbatch/Keira Knightly drama will expand throughout the month as it makes a play for the year-end awards race. In expansion news, the other high-toned British biopic, The Theory of Everything, expanded to 802 theaters this weekend. The Eddie Redmayne Felicity Jones drama earned $1.9m yesterday and is expected to earn over/under $6m for the five-day frame. That would give the Stephen Hawking/Jane Hawking biopic around $9m total.

In other holdover news, Big Hero 6 earned $7.74m on Friday, crossing the $156m mark and setting the stage for a $26m five-day holiday and robust $167m domestic cume (Wreck it Ralph had $149m by the end of Thanksgiving weekend). Interstellar earned $6.6m on Friday, bringing its domestic cume to $137.9m. It will likely end the frame with $153m domestic as it races towards $500m worldwide. Birdman is the Oscar bait film of choice as it will end the frame with $17m domestic while Gone Girl will cross $160m by tomorrow. Dumb and Dumber To earned $3.4m yesterday and will end the frame with $72m (about double its debut weekend) after an $11m holiday weeekend, while Behind the Lights will end the frame with $13m. Oh, and Fury crossed $80m and should end the frame with $82m while The Equalizer should cross $100m domestic by tomorrow.

That’s enough for today. Join us tomorrow for the full weekend estimates and more holdover news.

Friday Box Office: The 'Mockingjay' Soars Above $400M Worldwide - Forbes

So good to see it had a great stay this weekend against othetrs. And hopefully that continues into December!

The Hanging Tree
UK Top 40 :

As if things weren’t already going well enough for Jennifer Lawrence - known to millions as Hunger Games heroine Katniss Everdeen - she has now cracked the UK Top 40.
The Hanging Tree, which millions have recently heard on the soundtrack of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1, appeared in the charts this week at number 29, the BBC reports.

Billboard Hot 100 singles :

Jennifer Lawrence is aiming to score her first hit single on Billboard's charts.
The Academy Award-winning actress is heading for the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart with "The Hanging Tree," from her film The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part I.


Industry forecasters suggest the song, performed by James Newton Howard featuring Lawrence, may sell upwards of 150,000 downloads in the U.S. in the week ending Nov. 30. The song was released as part of Howard's score album for Mockingjay, which was released on Nov. 24.

That sales figure alone should be enough to enable the song's debut in the top 40 of the Hot 100, the top 10 of which will be revealed on Wednesday (Dec. 3). (The Hot 100 blends sales, airplay and streaming data to rank the 100 most popular songs of the week.)

ARIA Singles chart :

Debuting at #12 is the first time chart entry for two acts, musician and soundtrack guru James Newton Howard and Oscar winning actress Jennifer Lawrence from ‘The Hunger Games: Mockingjay: Part 1’ Soundtrack with the song/poem ‘The Hanging Tree

I wonder what Jen thinks of all of this? She freaking or what?

[AaronJ]

Heh. Flipping around looking for something to have on the TV for background, and I see The Hunger Games is on. Then I see it's on The Family Channel. Pretty grim content for TFC.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

Heh. Flipping around looking for something to have on the TV for background, and I see The Hunger Games is on. Then I see it's on The Family Channel. Pretty grim content for TFC.

Ha. Yeah, they play that on there sometimes. I saw a commercial for it. It was last year when CF came out it debuted. I wonder how much more it's edited.

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Michael Bay Fan

Ha. Yeah, they play that on there sometimes. I saw a commercial for it. It was next year when CF came out it debuted. I wonder how much more it's edited.

I'll tell you.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

I'll tell you.

Thanks. As you said it's not exactly a family friendly movie. hey kids let's all pile around and watch other kids kill one another.

[jscoggins]

Originally Posted by Michael Bay Fan

Thanks. As you said it's not exactly a family friendly movie. hey kids let's all pile around and watch other kids kill one another.

That's the American Way!

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by jscoggins

That's the American Way!

MURICA! F YEAH!

[Show spoiler]

[BladeRunner2007]

Totally random, I know. But WOW

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by BladeRunner2007

Totally random, I know. But WOW

[Show spoiler]

Wow is right.

Thank you.

"Save Image To 'Downloads'"

ETA: Oh, and you may very well "break" MBF with that one. Heh.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by BladeRunner2007

Totally random, I know. But WOW

Totally random is fine with me. And Wow indeed.

Originally Posted by AaronJ

Wow is right.

Thank you.

"Save Image To 'Downloads'"

ETA: Oh, and you may very well "break" MBF with that one. Heh.

Uh-huh!

That pics if from a Dior shoot she did a while back. Plenty more where that came from.

LOL. Perhaps. Those legs.

[Jett Rink]

Originally Posted by BladeRunner2007

Totally random, I know. But WOW

This is the only pic of her that I find attractive. It has a slight 1980's vibe to it, that is probably why it appeals to many.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by Jett Rink

This is the only pic of her that I find attractive. It has a slight 1980's vibe to it, that is probably why it appeals to many.

Okay. As I said. You should see the rest of the shoot. You'll like that aswell. You're gonna like those pics. I guarantee it.

[Jett Rink]

Originally Posted by Michael Bay Fan

Okay. As I said. You should see the rest of the shoot. You'll like that aswell. You're gonna like those pics. I guarantee it.

Shoot me a link. I may like the others as well, but pics of her in general just don't suit me. Try not to take it out on me too hard.

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Jett Rink

This is the only pic of her that I find attractive. It has a slight 1980's vibe to it, that is probably why it appeals to many.

Umm, I wouldn't call that 80s at all, frankly. Hair is nowhere near big enough or teased out enough, and both the outfit and the shot itself are way too minimal and monochromatic. Remember this?



(And trust me, I'm not trying to rip into Morgan. Love her. But still.)

[Jett Rink]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

Umm, I wouldn't call that 80s at all, frankly. Hair is nowhere near big enough or teased out enough, and both the outfit and the shot itself are way too minimal and monochromatic. Remember this?



(And trust me, I'm not trying to rip into Morgan. Love her. But still.)

I said slight 80's vibe. Mainly because of the washed out makeup look. and her skirt and hairstyle.

[Jennifer Lawrence Fan]

Originally Posted by Jett Rink

Shoot me a link. I may like the others as well, but pics of her in general just don't suit me. Try not to take it out on me too hard.

Here you go. It's only a few. Tell that to Mr. Bat. lol.

[Show spoiler]






A additional from the same set, but different look. Her eyes in this one reall pops out at you.

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Jett Rink

I said slight 80's vibe. Mainly because of the washed out makeup look. and her skirt and hairstyle.

Ah, ok. Fair enough.