Okay, so I'm a bit slow with popular trends. I went to watch the movie before deciding to buy the set of books, and after I bought them, it's a month or two later that I start flipping the pages.
The movie's exciting. It's like a mix-up of all genres available, and above everything that's obviously made-up, it's so much in tune with the dog-eat-dog world we live in today. Well, they might have exaggerated on the differences between the classes (ie. the Capitol and the Districts); or maybe they didn't. Maybe they just showed us what we haven't been seeing, what we think that didn't exist.
So I picked up Book 1 and I must admit, the first few pages seemed boring to me. Perhaps it was because I had been expecting more from Suzanne Collins; judging from the movie I watched with my friends, I thought her book should be another Harry Potter: deep and complicated and extremely detailed. Well, that was kinda my fault. What I've learnt from a year of reading and conversation classes with Dr. Don Gilleland is that each writer has his or her own unique writing style. Of which the lesson didn't occur to me until halfway through the book, and by then I was already sucked into the world of Panem.
What's different about the movie and the book is that the movie shows us stuff; the book tells us the story. Katniss' story. Well, writing in first person helps. Although both centers around the heroine, the movie being an adaptation of the novel, I was given separate perspectives of the character. The movie pictures the sixteen-year-old as strong, tough, independent and most of the time fearless. In the book, readers are welcomed to her gentle side, her sisterly love, her responsibility to family (no matter how many times she say about how much she hates her mother), and get in touch with her inner self, all the insecurity, the worries, the contradiction going on in her mind, the adrenaline rush, and every bit of hurt and pain she received in the Games. I would like to take note here about her transfer from her District 12 to the Capitol. In the movie, she seems to be in absolute denial for a certain period of time. Her attitude kinda stinks. And real bad, compared to the book, which showcased her as quickly adjusting to her environment. The conflict between Katniss and Haymitch is there in both material, and while the relationship between Katniss and Effie in the movie is considerably distant, the book shows them as relatively indifferent. By the way, I didn't take note of Effie's name until I read the book. In the movie, I just remember her as the annoying-lady-in-pink. Turns out she's not that terrible in the book. Sure, a bit lost about using her words, but I just might like her.
The movie shows us everything in general, but the book takes us in through the eyes and mind of Katniss Everdeen. So I believed the filmmakers added some extras of their own. Like at the beginning of the movie, Prim was screaming in bed like crazy as the day of the reaping draws near, but there was nothing in the book. Prim was calmer than she appeared to be in the movies. She didn't make a scene like she did in the movie when her name was called out at the assembly. And when Katniss volunteered as tribute there wasn't any fuss, no complications, no struggle with the officials. Gale just took Prim away with little argument and Katniss just walked on stage. The movie went a little dramatic with this part. But that's good, in a way. Makes things go a bit more lively. So, Prim was an insecure little girl who's even afraid of her own shadow, but from what Katniss says in the book, Prim's alright as long as she has her goat Lady and, as a bonus, she knows some stuff about herb and medicine from helping their mother with the patients that come every once in a while. Katniss ditched these times to go hunting, running away from the fear of looking at people in deadly situations with little chance of recovery.
Most of everything else in the movie remains loyal to the original, especially the trials in the arena, and when Katniss' feelings about Peeta kicks in. Before we go any further, I would like to point out that Katniss wasn't sure what to do about the relationship between herself and Gale. She didn't refer to him as her boyfriend (which I assumed he was before I read the book) but more like hunting partners looking out for one another's family. So when Peeta got into the picture, she got even more confused and tried to put the two of them on two different pages, knowing that she had to face it when they return home, although she had been juggling with the probabilities of survival. In the book, she keeps thinking about whichever champion that emerged in the finale would bring more benefit to Prim and their mother back home. First, she was considering either she or Peeta survive will do, hoping that the latter won't be killed by her own hand, but when the odds are slowly leaving her, she was hoping that Thresh from District 11 could win, after Rue's death and his letting her go just once. I think it was overcome by respect, or the idea that Katniss didn't want to keep owing him. Oh, about after Rue's death, there was an addition in the movie not mentioned in the book. A riot broke out in District 11 right after Katniss surrounded Rue's body in flowers and left her, and as she did, she put three middle fingers to her lips and then raised them high for the viewers to see. It is an indirect sigh of rebellion. That and the thing about the flowers. I made a personal comment that the person who started the riot (as pictured in the movie) could be Rue's family.
Another thing that leaves me thinking about the aftermath of Katniss' and Peeta's victory is a short scene in the movie that shows us the chief Gamemaker having some time alone with a bowl of berries. Obviously he was pushed into it and worked it out very quickly that it was the Mayor's decision to get rid of him. Those aren't just ordinary berries. Those were the berries in the arena which Peeta had nearly taken and which both he and Katniss had planned to take at the end of the Games as a showcase of rebelliousness against the Capitol. What was the name? Nightlock? Berries that will have you dead before they even reach your stomach. Right. The book didn't mention a thing about the chief Gamemaker's execution. Maybe it does in the second book, which I haven't started reading.
The book is a good few hundred pages, not as thick as the Harry Potter series can go to, and it makes much lighter reading. It was difficult to make peace with the book during the first half of the reading, when I was still heavily influenced by what the movie has showed me. Last night, I took off from where I left at Page 196... and zoomed all the way to the end of book 1. That took a few hours, but I just couldn't put it down! I was reading about their win just as the rays of the sun began to seep in through the windows!
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