Genre Essay

The Hunger Games 2 Catching Fire

The Hunger Games is an action thriller based film from the trilogy The Hunger games Trilogy which is known to be one of the bestselling books in the world, this movie is a follow of from the first hunger games movie and is said to be more action packed than the first one. The cast of this film include: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, and Liam Hemsworth and is directed by Francis Lawrence.

The first shot is a long shot of the main character, which is Jennifer Lawrence followed by the lines: ‘I understand that whatever I do it comes back to you and mom, but I don’t want you to get hurt.’ This signifies that a big event is going to happen later on which will affect different characters later on in the film. The plot of the film is to eliminate the surviving player. This gives it the characteristics of a thriller because the aim of the trailer is telling us that someone must die. Also other characters say ‘they want to kill us.’ And ‘they want to fight.’ Which suggests to us that a battle is going to happen, this also supports the binary oppositions of good VS bad, or in the case the survivors VS predators?

The setting in some parts of the trailer is also significant because it is a stadium like setting, which is has been created for that particular event. We can tell this is a big and important event because of the masses of people gathered there which suggests they are waiting and wanting to watch something because it is in a stadium, this adds to the theme of the genre because it adds an emphasis to the idea that anything can happen and reinforces the thrilling feeling the audience.

Low key lighting is used to create the films genre effect due to the fact that a mysterious effect would not be created if high key lighting was used. It is evident a lot of editing and camera effects have been used, in shots such as the fire and battle scenes to produce the idea that it is an action pact film and the flames will cause paranoia to the audience as it is a weapon, the fire is also significant to the title of the film because it is called ‘Catching Fire’ which leaves the audience wanting to know how the fire is used. Flashes of light is used within the trailer repeatedly which could be seen as many things one of these things being lightning. Many people have a phobia towards lightning which would allow the movie to become a thriller as it will have a huge effect on the audience, lightning is also seen as negative and it is usually dark when lightning is struck and this also adds to the genre of the film as in order to create a film which is going to ‘thrill’ your audience a producer needs to be sure that it will scare them and I believe that this would.

A lot of computer features are also included in the trailer when we are shown the characters training for the games creates an action like feel as these features allow the movie to feel more like a movie than real life also the fact that these ideas have been created and brought into the trailer suggests that these impossible features that are not around today can be made possible in the near future as the world is rapidly advancing and could allow the audience to relate themselves to a character in the movie.

The weapons that we are introduced to in the trailer also make a connection to the films genre. Being an action film gives the impression that what we are about to see will be extraordinary, something in which we have not seen before and the weapons they used creates this impression as well as the lighting, costumes and music which we hear.

The music we hear in the trailer has a huge impact on the whole genre of the film. The trailer beings with diagetic sound. This sound being a spooky like sound which creates the thriller effect, this sound also sounds like a magical song which links to the idea of the film being an action film this also creates the effect that we are not aware of what is going to happen next. The sound gradually gets louder and faster which makes the audience mood and feelings towards the film differ as anxiety will be felt as well as paranoia of what is about to happen.