The revolution will be televised

There’s nothing prissy about Katniss Everdeen. Whether she’s stringing another bow to fell a rabbit in the post-apocalyptic forests of Panem, or slugging back a brewski with scruffy mentor Haymitch (Woody Harrelson), she’s the tough chick to watch in Catching Fire, the second in the Hunger Games trilogy. Played by Jennifer Lawrence, Katniss is a little wiser and more calculating than in her first bout — she’s picked up a few tricks knocking heads with Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper in Silver Linings Playbook, and she’s nobody’s child.

But her heart is still an uncharted forest, to extend the metaphor, caught between the hometown boy from District 12 that she fancies (Liam Hemsworth), and the dude she didn’t finish off in The Hunger Games, Peeta (Josh Hutcherson), now her partner in a state-sanctioned victory tour from district to district.

Not only that, but Katniss’s exploits in the first round of the death match have won her a huge popular following, and she begins to see this growing stature may contain the seeds of revolution against the evil authoritarian state run by President Snow (Donald Sutherland, slithery and sly).

Katniss is reluctantly thrown together with Peeta, who’s totally crushing on her but can’t seem to get her to stop scowling in his direction. They’re on a train ride across Panem, making speeches about the “generosity” of the state — a police state that keeps the populace hungry and terrified with constant goon squad sweeps and brutal floggings. The two victors let slip a few indecorous comments, and the crowd roars its approval, making the three-finger “Mockingjay” hand gesture that signals solidarity. Katniss begins to see there may be strength in numbers.

What’s amusing this time around is the way Katniss and Peeta share center stage like some reality show couple (The Bachelorette, maybe), forced to kiss on camera and hold hands. Katniss clearly calls the shots, but Peeta grows in her estimation, from a fumbling rabbit to someone she wants to protect, maybe even could love.

The reality show bit is part of the trilogy’s social commentary (I haven’t read the books): in the future, not only will people seek entertainment from watching teens kill one another on TV to win a “tribute,” the survivors will then be held up as model citizens, constantly trotted out onscreen to show how benevolent the state is. Your basic bread and circuses scenario. Except, without the bread.

Because yes, people are starving in Panem, and the goon squads take orders from Snow, and all insurrection is met with clubbings and firebombings. One can see glimpses of other authoritarian states here, whether it’s Cambodia under Pol Pot or North Korea under Kim Jong Il and his ilk. And possibly even a few shots taken at American consumerism culture and the appalling inequities (and self-shaming) that fame produces. But possibly I’m reading into things too much.

Along for the thundering ride this time is Plutarch (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a “games maker” who has devised an even more challenging round for the Hunger Games survivors in the Quarter Quell: the best of the best will face off, to the death, of course; but naturally those rules will be bent as Katniss and her motley crew learn to all get along.

The survivors face more elaborate challenges than one another this time, including bloody rain, poisonous fog and bloodthirsty CGI monkeys. They’re upping the action ante on the series, though what gets sacrificed is the focus on character, something that made the first Hunger Games a bit more watchable.

There are a few nutty roles, such as Jeffrey Wright, kind of like the Professor on Gilligan’s Island here, always coming up with some last-minute invention to save their skins; and his partner Amanda Plummer (“Yolanda!”) as Wiress, who doesn’t stick around long enough for her quirkiness to even grow on us. Jenna Malone and Sam Claflin are onboard, respectively, as Johanna and Finnick, two hardcore survivors who prove to be more helpful than cynical, and grab their share of the scenes. Of course, Stanley Tucci reprises his over-the-top TV host bit, playing Caesar Flickerman with outrageous pomp and pompadour. Costume design is once again handled by Lenny Kravitz (in the role of Cinna), though you have to wonder who does Katniss’s makeup in the opening scenes where she’s out poaching rabbits? Food may be scarce, but MAC eyeliner is abundant in the future.

It’s hard to say whether Lawrence is getting better in her role as Katniss, though this is surely the biggest box office opener of her career yet ($146 million on opening weekend). The Oscar win for Silver Linings Playbook showed she had more range, and doesn’t have to take roles that require a bow and arrow to seem strong and cool. But there’s not much complexity to be found in her role here. She trades dirty looks with President Snow who keeps threatening her family, and handles the action scenes with grace and skill. Better yet, she sinks her teeth into the role with her usual singleminded determination, and this elevates the movie.

At 150 minutes though, the movie does bog down in the forest scenes, which merely exist to catapult our players from one bad situation to another. In truth, Catching Fire merely exists as a cliffhanger setup for the third installment, Mockingjay, just as The Empire Strikes Back was supposed to mark time until the rebellion actually succeeds (though it did so in a more entertaining way). Eventually, Katniss finds a way to disrupt things in a move that seems to echo The Truman Show; though Hunger Games is full of echoes, from Battle Royale and Survivor to Logan’s Run and Ancient Rome. That the echoes all circle back to a teen franchise that refuses to take things too lightly is at least evidence that moviegoers want to think, rather than just watch moony vampires sparkle each other.