As any good reader of the book series can tell you, the trailer didn’t show any of the games themselves. Personally, I found that to be pretty cool. The trailer ended with the countdown to the games starting and the tributes sprinting towards the cornucopia. EPIC ending. However, there was a reasoning behind this! In a statement released by Lionsgate last week, they said:

“SANTA MONICA, CA (November 14, 2011) – The full trailer for the highly anticipated upcoming film THE HUNGER GAMES…. only shows footage from the first half of the film, chronicling events leading up to but not including the Games themselves.”
This was apparently done “In an attempt to preserve the anticipation and mystery that fans are relishing”.

Veh-hy interesting! Expect a two-part dissection of the trailer coming later this week.

May the odds be ever in your favor,
Sam.

My thoughts are, and I quote, “HOLY-MOLY-ME-OH-MAH GIMME MOAR” end-quote. It looks fantastic. Really. What I was most surprised about was how faithful to the story it looks like the film will be. Too often do we get annoying summary films of books that leave out so much that you end up walking out of the theater making excuses to your illiterate friends like “I swear, the original is wayy better than this was! Really!” *cough* The Last Airbender *cough* *cough* Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – no, seriously. That book was the longest of the first four, and the shortest movie. I hadn’t read the fourth book at the time I saw it. It made no sense. It was awful. I was confused. End of example. *cough* The Hunger Games, however, looks like it will really stick to the original book.

One worrisome thing is the rating. The trailer was rated PG. In Canada it was rated G. That worries me. Thankfully, the rating only applies to the trailer, not the film itself. After all, the film is still in post-production, there’s no way it has a rating yet. So why did Lionsgate try for the “G” rating? Down With the Capitol says what they think the reasoning for this is:

The ‘G’ Rating only applies to the film’s trailer– probably a move on Lionsgate’s part to ensure that it can run before as many films as possible (trailers rated above a G are limited as to which kinds of movies they can run with).

So I really don’t think we have much to worry about on this front. But this does bring me to the point of ratings. Anyone who read the book would (or should) say that the film clearly deserves an “R” rating. This isn’t Harry Potter at school. This isn’t some teenage vampire drama. This is a film about children dying of hunger and murdering each other, usually in rather gruesome ways. However, the film will get a PG-13. We can be pretty sure of that. Lionsgate is laying everything on the line with this movie. If Hunger Games does poorly, it’s questionable whether they will be around to make movies for our kids to see (to put it nicely). They need to get the young-adult audience Harry Potter and Twilight captured.

Another thought occurred to me last night: did this trailer make the least bit of sense to anyone who didn’t read the book? I don’t know a single person who saw the trailer who didn’t like it, but did it make any sense. I know for myself, if I randomly saw that trailer at a theater my first reaction would be “what the heck is going on here??” I asked my dad, who saw the trailer and didn’t read the books: he said he thought it looked great, but had to have some parts explained by my mom and sis. All-in-all, I think we can say the trailer was clearly made as fan-service.

If you HAVEN’T seen the trailer yet, what the &*@# is wrong with you?? watch it here!

According to Mockingjay.net, it’s been confirmed that the Hunger Games trailer is going to run at the beginning of Breaking Dawn (you know, that mushy mess of sparkling vampires movie?). Not that you should go see that movie. I fully expect it will be bad. It would be very cool, however, to see this amazing trailer on the big screen!

May the odds be ever in your favor,
Sam.

I know I haven’t been posting much, but I just found this group on flickr and man is it cool! I’ve always been a sucker for “transparent” photography and video, and seeing so much of it here almost inspires me to start myself!
I have some other cool info to share soon on my blog as well, but as I’ve decided to read the entire Harry Potter series in the next week before the premiere of Deathly Hallows Part 2 I’m going to be reading 24/7. I’ve never read the series before, so here goes nothing!

Happy Trails,
Sam.

ANOTHER new photo in my set. TWO in ONE DAY!! This must feel like the greatest day of your life! Check out my Flickr if you haven’t. It will keep getting better as I put more stuff I like up.

Happy Trails,
Sam.

I guess I forgot to explain why I haven’t posted as much lately! Well other than the usual, I also got a new Canon Rebel T2i camera. My first DSLR, and I’ve been having lots of fun with it! This is one of my favorites so far. I’ll be posting them on my Flickr, so keep checking back there! I’m starting a new photo project, but I’m going to wait a little bit until I reveal the full details on that. Enjoy!

Happy Trails,
Sam.

Shia LaBeouf on the new Transformers:

“It’s the greatest 3-D film ever made. It’s an amalgamation of ideas from Jim Cameron, Steven and Michael…. The only artificial element is the robots. You’re really blowing Chicago up. It’s really an invasion….”

That’s just a really stupid statement. Then:

“The last hour of this movie is the greatest action sequence of Mike’s career, which would put it on the same level as the greatest action ever made,”

…Well that’s a little stuck-up of Shia to say, especially considering how bad the second movie was. Then he says…

“You don’t breathe for the last hour. There’s just no letup, but it’s also not completely overwhelming and disconnected, as the second movie was”

The problem was that the second movie was dumb, uninspired, and even made the constant explosions boring. It was nonstop action, and it sounds like the third is gonna suck just as much… Too bad. Heck, Michael Bay says the new movie is “way better than the second”… Now when both the lead actor and the director say a movie sucks, you know it’s bad!

Review of the second movie from Rolling Stone: “beyond bad, it carves out its own category of godawfulness.” It apparently also won the Razzie that year for worst director, worst script and worst film. I had forgotten that, but it’s pretty obvious it’s going to be lame. But then again, who cares? I don’t think I will ever be able to take Shia LaBeouf serious when he’s standing in the middle of the street screaming “OPTIMUUUS!!!” It’s just silly.

In other movie news, Green Lantern was lame. Thor was okay. Super 8 was fantastic! I loved the new Pirates of the Caribbean (one of my favorite film series!). The new Cars looks a little disappointing, though I love Pixar like nothing else and hope it’s just as amazing as everything they touch! In fact I’ll probably go see Cars 2 tomorrow and let y’all know what I think. Transformers… yeah… we’ll see.

Love,
Sam.

This, for all those who have been wondering and waiting for proof, is my mohawk.

Window to a morning world

Happy Tears Trails,
Sam.