The best-selling novel is now a major movie

When Wilson Yuloque, big boss of Pioneer Films, invited me three weeks ago to cover the Hollywood junket for Divergent, my first reaction was, “Divergent? What’s that?”

I got curious and really interested when Wilson said, “It’s the next Hunger Games,” the movie released by his company, “the next big, big hit.”

Hunger Games, the best-selling trilogy by Suzanne Collins, was a huge hit worldwide, turning Jennifer Lawrence (who plays the main character, featured in The STAR last year) into an overnight superstar. The second installment titled Catching Fire was also a box-office buster, released late last year, with the third movie (Mockingjay) coming out late this year.

It was also Pioneer Films that released in the Philippines the last four of Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga (New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn broken into two parts; the first was released by Viva Films) that likewise made its cast (Kristen  Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner, also interviewed by The STAR four times) big stars.

When my nephew Raymond de Asis Lo, The STAR’s L.A. correspondent, learned that I was attending the Divergent junket, he gasped, “Wow, really!?! The lead actress, Shailene Woodley, is predicted to be the next Jennifer Lawrence.”

I became all the more curious and more interested, so I rushed to the National Bookstore to buy a copy of Divergent. Only a few copies left, said the saleslady, “Mabili ‘yung book!,” adding, “but it’s sold out in this (Megamall) branch. Try at our branch in near Gateway (Cubao, Quezon City).”

Luckily, I got one of the three copies on display and read it in three days, all 487 pages plus the 72-page bonus materials. It’s unstoppable, holding you in suspense (the cliffhanger at the end of every chapter) as, I think, the movie version definitely would.

Divergent, the debut novel of New York Times  No. 1 best-selling American author Veronica Roth, comes in trilogy with the second and third books (Insurgent and Allegiant) now available also at National Bookstores. Set within a dystopian version of Chicago, Divergent is being compared to young-adult books like Hunger Games.

Understandably, Divergent is a hit among the young-adult market because its subject is so familiar (especially among the campus crowd) and thus easy to identify with — yes, initiation rites similar to those conducted by fraternities, only far more violent and more relentless, featuring more death-defying challenges, with the factions divided according to their guiding principles in life — Abnegation for selflessness, Candor for honesty, Erudite for knowledge, Amity for friendship and Dauntless for bravery. And who are the Divergent and what faction does the lead character Beatrice “Tris” Prior belong to?

As usual, I won’t spoil the suspense but rather let you find out for yourselves from the book in case you haven’t read it yet and from the movie which you should see. (More on the movie in forthcoming stories from interviews with the stars. Stay tuned.)

Woodley plays Beatrice, a role that is physically demanding and a far cry from the dramatic one she played in critically-acclaimed The Descendants in which she stars with George Clooney and for which she won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actress and nominated by the Golden Globe for the same honors. For her performance in The Spectacular Now, Woodley bagged the Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.

Still, the tongue-twisting name doesn’t ring so many bells yet but it is safely predicted to once Divergent opens worldwide third week of this month. That’s what happened to the stars of the Twilight Saga and the Hunger Games Trilogy, remember? Although they had earlier done a few films, they didn’t hit it big until they were cast in those franchises.

So mark the name: Shailene Woodley.

Cast as Tobias “Four” Eaton, the instructor to the initiates born outside of Dauntless (the faction they want to transfer to), is British actor Theo James (featured as one of last year’s sexiest men by People magazine’s annual selection) whom The STAR interviewed in 2012 for Underworld Awakening (starring Kate Beckinsale) in which he played a vampire.

For Awakening, James said that he trained in various forms of combat, adding, “One of them is a Filipino type of martial arts using only the hand,” referring to Arnis de Mano. “I trained with a Filipino instructor. I also trained in firing a gun and in boxing.”

I’m sure that James did more preparation for Divergent because his role requires him to do, as I was saying, “death-defying” scenes (such as jumping off a moving train into the roof of a building, etc.).

Now, will Shailene Woodley and Theo James follow in the footsteps of the Twilight and Hunger Games stars?

Lionsgate and Summit, producers of the movie, believe that Divergent is solid enough to withstand comparisons with Twilight and Hunger Games. The anticipation over Divergent, directed by Neil Burger, has been heightened by the success of the two franchises mentioned and the failure of a string of recent book-based, teen-targeting movies like The Host and Mortal Instruments: City of Bones which their studios had hoped would launch franchises.

According to Wilson, whose company has been releasing hits, the first Twilight movie opened to $69M in Nov. 2008 and eventually grossed $192M and spawned four sequels. Over all, the franchise has raked in $3.3B globally.

Can Divergent (and the planned movie versions of the two other books) beat that?

Worth watching for, isn’t it? 

(E-mail reactions at [email protected]. You may also send your questions to [email protected]. For more updates, photos and videos visit www.philstar.com/funfare or follow me on www.twitter/therealrickylo.)