This is a story about a teenage girl trying to overcome her oppressive, corrupt government that tries to control everybody, and the only one she truly trusts is her boyfriend. So basically, its Hunger Games, but without any games…. unless you count those ‘faction test’ things as the stand in.
I already wasn’t really a big fan of the Hunger Games. I don’t hate it, I just never cared for the story or characters that much. I think it’s the formula that the story follows, with the angsty teenage romance and the generic corrupt government. Divergent follows the same formula, the only difference is in the details.
When the trailers for Divergent came out, I wasn’t too impressed. I thought it was just another teenage rebellion movie that was trying to cash in on the success of Hunger Games, another teenage rebellion movie. I never went to see it, but my older sister seemed to like it, and highly recommended it. Even more so than Hunger Games. So, I finally got around to watching the first one (over a year later and way after its sequel came out) just to see if it is any better than Hunger Games. I personally didn’t see much difference.
Don’t get me wrong- I don’t hate this movie. I don’t think it’s bad. I actually think there’s a lot of good effort that went into some areas. But the parts that it doesn’t work so well for me really bring it down.
For the positives, I liked the cinematography. It’s a beautifully shot film, with cleverly thought out and well executed camera work. I also liked the feel of the world that surrounded the characters. But not only does the movie look nice (nice for a post apocalyptic world) it sounds nice, too. I liked the soundtrack much more than I expected to. I’m glad it wasn’t all generic background music. It wasn’t the best musical score ever, but it was still very nicely composed. For me, that’s where the positives end.
The elements that seemed weak to me were the story, the characters, and the acting. I know I’m probably going to make fans of the Divergent movies and books mad when I say this, but I really, really don’t see this as much different from Hunger Games. It’s the same exact angsty teenage rebellion formula, and I really do feel as though it was just made to feed off of the success of Hunger Games.
The acting is simply okay. It’s not great, it’s not horrible, it’s just okay. Shailene Woodley is a decent actress, but I feel as though they could have gotten anyone to play the same role. The character she plays isn’t very interesting, either. Tris is just the interchangeable teenage girl rebel character. They could have switched her with Katniss, and it wouldn’t have made much difference other than Archery. Theo James, the interchangeable boyfriend, is alright. I liked him a lot more than Peeta, that’s for sure. The other actors range from Jai Courtney levels of bland acting to tolerable on the grading scale. Yes, Jai Courtney is in this. He could be a lot better at acting if he put more emotion on his face. For those of you that either don’t know or don’t remember who Jai Courtney is, I think his acting is the reason why. He hasn’t been in much, but it doesn’t look like he’ll stop getting cast soon. For some reason.
In the end, Divergent is just… okay. It didn’t offer anything new to the formula it follows, it didn’t impress me with its story, its acting, or its writing. But I still wouldn’t consider it a bad movie. Far from it. With the skill behind the camera work, I’m positive that some amount of effort went somewhere. If you can see more to like in it than I can, good for you. I highly doubt I’ll see the sequels, but on the off chance that I do, I’ll review them.
FINAL RATING: 28 / 50
STORY: 3 / 5
ACTING: 3 / 5
CHARACTERS: 3 / 5
CINEMATOGRAPHY: 4 / 5
DRAMA/ACTION: 3 / 5
SOUNDTRACK: 4 / 5
TONE: 3 / 5
ENJOYABILITY: 3 / 5
REWATCH VALUE: 1 / 5
OWNING VALUE: 1 / 5
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