Ah, forgot this opened haha. From a couple weeks back:
Slow burn but immensely great. This and P1 together are an altogether different beast to CF, while that was more fun and fast paced, this is a slow burn war film, I found this especially poignant and altogether the way they did it makes sense (minus long gap between the two parts), I don’t think a CF type film would be worked for this story, it’s not that type of film at all. Brilliant and fitting end. Temper expectations in terms of epic explosive conclusion because this is a slower and more thoughtful conclusion.
JLaw: fantastic but wasn’t expecting anything but. Hutch was great, Gale is probably my main nitpick, too obvious about his principles, talks a bit too much rhetoric at start, which is an odd characterisation change from P1 . Core supporting cast (Harrelson, Banks, PSH, Malone, Claflin, Sutherland) were a joy to watch, not too sure on Moore though (although one scene early on is fantastic) but we’ll see when I see this again tomorrow night.
Other points:
- trailers featured too many major lines and that took away from their impact in the film, especially with one scene early on.
- Squad 451 cast - underused but damn Henson (Foggy from Daredevil) was a standout, wish there was more Ali.
- Coin (Moore) unintentionally funny? Drew a few chuckles from the audience.
- Credits song and suite are beautiful, bravo JNH and JLaw.
That’s it for now, more tomorrow after rewatch.
8.5/10 CF>MJ2>HG>MJ (CF>MJ1&2 together as one>HG)
REWATCH THOUGHTS: even better. Watched MJ1 that morning and MJ2 really made me appreciate how they did it. Best way to watch is definitely back to back. Will explain why in spoiler bit.
Conclusion on Moore - mega enjoyable if a bit hammy. I guess audience reaction to her at the press screening is what got me mixed initially on her. And the middle action set piece with the mutts and the meat grinder underground is absolutely fantastic. A JLaw scene late in the game is her Oscar clip if there ever was an HG one. Overall Francis and Nina delivered, again, a CF style movie would have at the very least diluted the gut punch and emotional impact of this part especially.
Also what I really loved is the characterisation and the evolution of Katniss’ arc from P1 to 2, Peeta’s state basically gets her to pull herself together.
Back to back watch MJ1&2 is a must because some of the deaths, especially Prim and Boggs, make much more of an impact. Because Prim is only in two scenes before BOOM and Boggs dies too soon relative to runtime, only at the 45 minute mark
Sutherland gets the last laugh and it is EPIC. That scene is so good.
Julianne’s ham kinds gives it away what’s gonna happen to her, at least that’s who I went with (who hasn’t read the third book) felt.
One scene was very Thunderball, I was expecting Snow almost to go “this organisation does not tolerate failure”. Turns out in the end it was an Untouchables homage according to Francis, guess my SPECTRE hype got in the way lol (funny, both star Connery)
Seems critics are counting the return home as part of the epilogue, THE epilogue is only 2 minutes.