#72 HUNGER GAMES: MOCKING JAY PART 2

#72 HUNGER GAMES: MOCKING JAY PART 2

Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabether Banks, Julianne Moore, Philip Syemour Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright, Sam Calflin, Jena Malone, Stanley Tucci and Donald Sutherland. Written by Peter Craig and Danny Strong.

Directed by Francis Lawrence. Budget 160 million. Running time 137 minutes long (2 hrs 17 minutes)

Bish bosh, job done! That's another YA masterpiece nailed, four films out of three books and Hollywood can sit back and count the coffers, which currently stands at about 1.4 billion dollars, so quids in then for the bean counters and money men, but what about us, the humble cinema fans, how have we fared?

So, this is the 2nd half of the last movie, based on the third book in the series and right off the bat I want to stress that this decision to cut the final book into two movies has nothing at all to do with the greed of those money men but a genuine artistic decision made by a band of artisans and craftsman and women who strive everyday for the purity of their art. And in no way did this decision sap any of the energy and excitement out of the series, no siree, I for one, thought the last film which consisted of mainly the main characters standing around in rubble mopping about waiting for the fourth film to start was excellent. No seriously excellent, I love the idea of an action free blockbuster.

So what of this one, well it certainly isn't cutting you, the viewer any slack that's for sure. With no recap or 'previously' we are literally thrown into the deep end and expected to run like fuck to keep up. Katnip has a nasty throat rash which might be a huge hickey or it might be where her creepy, stalky, off/on, 'boyfriend/beard', Pitta tried to throttle the life out of her. Then there's her other boyfriend the pouting, man-mountain called Gale who runs around pouting and being a man-moutain. After that there's lots of other male characters who have dicussons behind Katnip's back constantly deciding what she's going to do, so much of the plot of this film takes place off camera that what we're left with is Katnip just plodding from A-Z joining the dots to the end. Along the way we get some dramatic, well mounted action scenes, some as always superb acting from Jennifer Lawrence and a final look at the awesomeness of Philip Seymour Hoffman who really was a remarkably good actor. The action builds methodically till then end when Katniss decides to miss the actual capture of Donald Sutherland's President Snow and leave the win to someone else, which really sucks all the drama out of this and robs us of closure.

Obvs we then have a glimpse of what the future holds with a new president courtesy of Julianne Moore's Coin before a soapy happy ending and that's it.

So, worth it or not? Well the first two films were great, the second was exceedingly good but these last two have been a tad flat, well made for sure but just not that much cop, it would be wonderful think what could have been done if the last film had been stretched to three hours and made into one, I think it would have been a far better movie.

So, if you've watched the last three you might as well watch this one too, otherwise you'll never know how it ends (the goodies win the baddies don't).

Well made, glum, grim and gritty. 8/10