I am excited - though pretty nervous, too - about the prospect of "The Hunger Games" as a movie.
I've been burned by filmmakers before when they completely screw up books I love. But "The Hunger Games" seems like it is just made for the big screen treatment! There is so much action and excitement, and I love the idea of seeing Katniss' gritty home in District 12 and the insanity of the Capitol and the excitement of the Games.
That being said, I am really pretty unhappy with the talk of Katniss' casting - specifically, the scuttlebutt that blond-haired, blue-eyed Jennifer Lawrence might play her.
(Cue the Luke Skywalker yell after he finds out that Darth Vader is his father - angry face and all): NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!
It's not that I don't like Jennifer Lawrence. She's obviously a good actress and she was very good in "Winter's Bone." However, SHE IS NOT KATNISS. SHE LOOKS NOTHING LIKE KATNISS. Katniss is not a blond haired, blue eyed beauty. Katniss is darker, with olive skin, gray eyes and dark hair. This is a key part of her character, because she looks like all the other workers in District 12. I realize that the Katniss on the big screen will not look like the Katniss in my head, just like always, but she needs to at least resemble the character described, just like Ron Weasley needed to have red hair. It's part of who they are.
The other issue I have with that is the whitewashing they are, therefore, doing to the character by having Katniss played by a very white actress. Hollywood has a terrible track record with whitewashing (Exhibit A: "The Last Airbender." *shudder*). Performers of other races - it seems, especially actresses - are ignored in favor of the pretty Caucasian girl. That seems like what they're doing again. Why not find some great actress who isn't a whitey-white-white girl with blond hair? They ARE out there! Hell, if they want an Oscar-nominated actress, why not at least go with Hailee Steinfeld from "True Grit?" At least she looks more like Katniss than Jennifer Lawrence. It's absolutely deplorable that Lawrence's name would even be bandied about for the role when she so obviously doesn't even resemble the character. This is such a great opportunity for people - especially impressionable teens and preteens - to see real racial diversity in a movie.
I mean, besides, the whole idea of making Katniss light-skinned and blond would screw up the deliberate racial undertones in the novel, since the lower class of workers in District 12 is olive-skinned and the merchant class is pale and blond. HELLO? I'm pretty sure Suzanne Collins didn't just put that detail in for shits and giggles, especially considering that the novel has some very real commentary on class and race in it.
I hope I'm wrong and that the producers hear the outcry and make sure that they cast Katniss correctly ... but I don't hold out a ton of hope. Hollywood has let me down many times before, and I'm really afraid it will again. It's too bad, because "The Hunger Games" has such potential, both to be a great movie and to offer up some real diversity and real opportunities for a diverse group of young actors.
Dude, you should just accept it now that the Hunger Games movies will be nothing like the book. I mean, how can they possibly make a book that has 20-some violent killings into a PG-13 movie? It just isn't going to happen in the way we want.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, they definitely need to have a ton of diversity in the casting because the characters are so racially different. And I think that Josh Hutchinson should be Peeta, so Katniss needs to look like a different class from him!
They totally cast that girl from Winter's Bone. I'm not fussed, mostly just because I kind of expect them to ruin it. I am really picky about film adaptations, which seem to either be awesome or awful. After watching the HP films, I no longer expect them to capture the magic (pun intended) of the original books.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of doing wrong things with the look of a character because you want pretty white girls, I am still displeased with what they did to Luna Lovegood. Where are her absurd thick glasses? Exchanged for makeup. Lame.