• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Hunger Games casting news

label

label

Vice Admiral
Admiral
So, apparently the people in charge suck. Here's who was cast in the lead role:

http://www.thewrap.com/movies/colum...nce-gets-lead-role-hunger-games-25482?_r=true

Outside of casting someone like Jennifer Anniston, I literally cannot think of a person less suited to play the character of Katniss in the movies. The character in the book is supposedly darker complected, is underfed, athletic/toned, and looks to be 15 when the book starts. Lawrence is a full figured, beautiful blond who doesn't appear to be any younger than 21.

The entire point of the books was about children killing other children for sport........ironically, if J. Lawrence were alive in the books, she'd already be to old to participate. (by several years).

With how tragically bad this casting decision is I don't hold a lot of hope out for the movies. They still might make it work, but lord they are off to a bad start.
 
Jennifer Lawrence is an excellent actress who is a big marquee draw now. They're lucky to have gotten her for this movie. Any movie would be lucky to get her. She'll definitely increase the box office draw just by virtue of her name and her face on the ad campaigns.

Whatever actress they got for the role, she isn't going to look 15 (how many 15 year olds are decent actors who can carry a movie? do you want Miley Cyrus???) and she isn't going to look scrawny and haggard no matter what (do you want Lindsay Lohan???) :rommie:

I suppose they could hire an actress who is willing to do the Christian Bale thing and starve herself into looking right for the part, but that would creep people out, and if she were under 18, it would be child abuse. Do you want everyone associated with this movie to be thrown in jail???
 
Temis the Vorta said:
Jennifer Lawrence is an excellent actress who is a big marquee draw now. They're lucky to have gotten her for this movie. Any movie would be lucky to get her. She'll definitely increase the box office draw just by virtue of her name and her face on the ad campaigns.
Click to expand...

I didn't mean to suggest Jennifer wasn't an excellent actress at all. Though I've never seen her in anything (I rarely get out to the movies) I'm sure she's fine.

It's just that she's so the polar opposite of how Katniss was written in the book that it's difficult to conceive of how they could possibly pull it off with her in the lead role without compromising the source material.

whatever actress they got for the role, she isn't going to look 15 (how many 15 year olds are decent actors who can carry a movie?
Click to expand...

Chloe Moretz. she could have carried it and been an excellent Katniss and would have looked the part and age and everything.

That's just it with this movie.........this character must at least look 15 in order for many of the story elements to carry their proper weight. It's how young some of these kids are in the games (including Katniss) that makes what they go through all the more extraordinary and having someone who looks as unmistakably older as Lawrence does can only serve to undercut the whole thing.

do you want Miley Cyrus???)
Click to expand...

Depends on what you mean? ;) No, Miley is too old and far to filled out. Same problem as Lawrence except for Miley's not a serious actress.

do you want Lindsay Lohan???) :rommie:
Click to expand...

Well, we're back to what do you mean here. :D

Do you want everyone associated with this movie to be thrown in jail???
Click to expand...

Depends on how bad they screw the movie over. ;) Based on how they've started, I'm leaning towards yes.
 
The fundamental objection to Moretz would be that she isn't enough of a box office draw to make the backers of this movie happy. She did a nice job in a movie that underperformed box-office-wise and impressed the few people who bothered to see it. One day she might be able to carry a movie, but I don't think she's there yet. If a movie can't get funding, it won't get made.

Moretz looks like a perfectly healthy girl. She'd have to get made up to look "skinny" in that time honored Hollywood way of putting soot on someone's face and dressing them in rags to indicate extreme starvation. :rommie: We'll have to wink and nod at it anyway, so they could do the same with Jennifer Lawrence. They could also use makeup to shave off a few years so she'd pass as more or less the right age. And if necessary, they'll change the story so that the combatants are 18, or they just won't mention the age range.

Edit: judging from this picture, Lawrence is hardly full-figured. :wtf: Someone in the comments section even made the requisite "give her a sammich!" comment. :rommie:
 
Last edited:
Temis the Vorta said:
And if necessary, they'll change the story so that the combatants are 18, or they just won't mention the age range.
Click to expand...

That's my biggest concern.........if they do something like that, it would completely undercut the point of the story and why the games exist in the first place. In the books, you can't even qualify for the games once you're older than 17. The games are a very specific form of punishment to the districts and very directed at the children for a specific reason and to switch it to be older changes the dynamic of the story 180 degrees and weakens the story significantly.

Granted, they may still put out a spin-off variation of Hunger games that's similar in some ways and might even be awesome, but it won't be the Hunger Games story from the books which was fine without re-imaging.

As for Moretz.........the books were huge by themselves, they don't need a star to generate an audience......it'll be like the Harry potter books (though I don't imagine quite as big)
 
Why wouldn't communities want to send combatants who are around 20 years of age? That's the age at which you'd expect the optimal combo of physical stamina, strength and skill. 15 year olds would still be underdeveloped, and if another community sent in a ringer - someone who was around 20 that they said was 15 - anyone who played by the rules would be at a disadvantage. So everyone would lie, send 20 year olds, and that would be the defacto rules of the game.

Or to put it another way: there's a reason why soldiers tend to be 18-25 years old for cultures all around the world. It's been changing nowadays but that's because technology is making the physical strength and stamina of the soldier less important than training and experience. For hand to hand combat, 18-25 years old is what you want.
 
I would have been fine with either Lawrence or Moretz for the roll. They can easily make an actor look younger than they actually are in films these days. I'm looking forward to this film as well.
 
Temis the Vorta said:
Why wouldn't communities want to send combatants who are around 20 years of age? That's the age at which you'd expect the optimal combo of physical stamina, strength and skill. 15 year olds would still be underdeveloped,
Click to expand...

That's the whole point to the books.....the communities don't get to choose, they are made to send one child from each district by way of a drawing. The point is that they are not optimally prepared but are forced to sacrifice a child who is usually not prepared so they can televise the gruesome deaths and keep all the districts in line.

If it stops being children sent to the slaughter and it becomes the ages you suggest, it sort of misses the whole point to the "hunger games" in the first place.
 
I just finished reading the trilogy a couple weeks ago, and I LOVED it, and though I've not said anything in this thread, I've been silently in agreement with everything you've said.

Those new articles are definitely enlightening. I suppose if Suzanne Collins is okay with the casting, then that's okay with me, because the author knows her character the best.

I'm glad that it was acknowledged in the interview concerning Rue and Thresh's race. It makes me hopeful that they'll cast well for those characters (hmmm... do you think Willow Smith may work as Rue?).

It was another good point that Jennifer Lawrence is from the vicinity of Katniss' homeplace. Being born and raised in Appalachia should definitely help inform Jennifer's portrayal, as it apparently did in Winter's Bone (I've yet to see it, but I'm eager to).
 
Joy said:
Those new articles are definitely enlightening. I suppose if Suzanne Collins is okay with the casting, then that's okay with me, because the author knows her character the best.
Click to expand...

As much as I think Jennifer is the wrong body type/look for the part, it is hard to argue with the author of the book saying "this is Katniss". Who knows, with the stuff they can pull off in Hollywood nowadays, I suppose it's conceivable to think that they might be able to pull it off with her in the lead, though I think she's going to have to trim down a bit. (Not that she's in anyway overweight......)

I'm glad that it was acknowledged in the interview concerning Rue and Thresh's race. It makes me hopeful that they'll cast well for those characters (hmmm... do you think Willow Smith may work as Rue?).
Click to expand...

Depends on whether Willow smith can act better than she can sing. ;) I love her father but he's really about the same character in most movies and I just happen to love that character. Rue is a quirky little character who could be very interesting if they find the right person to play the part.

Still, I'm far more interested in who'll play Peeta and some of the other characters who play a larger part throughout all 3 movies/books.
 
I was unsure of this news, myself, until I saw that interview you posted. I can certainly see where they're coming from now, though I'm still not entirely convinced. I do wonder how strongly they considered Hailee Steinfield, though... she seems like she would be perfect for the part.

I am a bit disappointed at the fact that Katniss will be unambiguously white, though. The description of her in the book implies she probably has some Native blood in here, and it would have been good to see a Native character get a solid leading role in a major movie for a change.
 
I'm holding out for David Tennant to play Cinna. Only took two seconds from the moment Cinna showed up in the first novel for me to see him as David in my mind's eye, and the image has stuck.

I kept seeing Michael Sheen as Castor in Tron: Legacy whenever Caesar Flickerman showed up in the trilogy.
 
^ He would be great as Cinna, wouldn't he?

Haymitch is another that'll need someone good to carry the role. I'm honestly not sure who would be well-suited to it, though...
 
Canadave said:
^ He would be great as Cinna, wouldn't he?

Haymitch is another that'll need someone good to carry the role. I'm honestly not sure who would be well-suited to it, though...
Click to expand...

I've heard some suggest Robert downy jr's name suggested by many, and he could easily do it, but honestly I think it could just as easily be any number of actors.....for that matter, Charlie sheen could even play the part. :p
 
I've not read these books, but the comments about the ages of the characters reminds me of the common fear anytime people talk about making a movie version of Ender's Game.
 
I must admit, after doing some more reading on Lawrence, despite her not looking at all like I thought she should I'm more comfortable that she'll be able to pull off the part better than I originally thought.

That being said, I still think I would have preferred no names in the lead roles but I'll wait to see how it takes shape.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top