The Hunger Games

  Now, most of people who live in developed countries live in peaceful and democratized societies. But, some people who live in these societies worry about some social problems like capital monopoly or yellow journalism. These problems can be created by huge media conglomerates or state-run media companies. These companies make people confuse because they distort real facts to suit their appetite.

  “Hunger game” what I want to review shows these problems indirectly. This movie is originated from the novel which name is exactly same. In this movie, a fictional country which name is Panem is ruled by dictators. To maintain their power, Dictators make a cruel survival game which is called “Hunger game”. In this game, 24 people who live in 12 districts are participated by random selection. They have to kill each other if they want to survive in this game. Only one person would be saved from this cruel survival game. Moreover, this game is relayed by satellites all day long. One day, Prim was selected as a participant of district 12 in the 74th Hunger game. But she was so young that her elder sister whose name is Katniss decided to participate in the Hunger game instead of her sister. So, she sent to the capital city to take part in the Hunger game with her partner. During the game, many participants were brutally killed by their competitors. Katniss and her partner faced threats of murder several times. Finally, they won the Hunger game.

  The plot of this movie seems like Battle Royale’s which is a Japanese movie. In Battle Royale, middle school students killed each other to survive from the cruel game. They killed each other brutally. Also in the Hunger game, participants of this game consist of adolescents, and they killed each other using weapons or tools. I think that these motives are exactly same.

In this movie, I think that the director points out several social problems. First one is a capital monopoly. In this movie, there is a huge gap between the haves and the haves-not. The haves put enormous money on participants lives. They think that killing each other is a kind of entertainment activity. However, most of people who are poor should participate in the Hunger game by force. It is really unfair I think. Second one is a yellow journalism. In this movie, the game was relayed by satellites for 24 hours. Media owners think that killing each other is just an interesting game. They don’t mind its cruelty and they only focus on its thrill. Their attitudes look like a yellow journalism.

  This movie shows that media may be used in negative ways. During watching this movie, I think about media-related problems a lot. Contents of this movie are very good, but its motive is exactly same with other movie. So, I would give 3 stars (★★★☆☆) about this movie.