Murray Close/Lionsgate
With a title almost as cumbersome as the film itself, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes gives viewers more of the ridiculously named characters, absurd outfits and hairstyles, and child-murder tournaments that made the franchise a YA success. What it doesn’t deliver, however, is a center of attention with even one-tenth the charisma of original star Jennifer Lawrence, or a story of any significant consequence or suspense. A dreary and protracted (165 minutes!) prequel about how nefarious President Coriolanus Snow (previously played by Donald Sutherland) became evil, this rote affair would deserve the designation “for fans only,” if not for the sneaking suspicion that even they won’t be wowed by this return trip to Panem.
Directed by Francis Lawrence, who helmed three of the four previous installments, and based on Suzanne Collins’ 2020 novel of the same name, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (Nov. 17, in theaters) is the one thing worse than terrible: bland. Following a pointless prologue snapshot of the war-ravaged Capitol, the film concentrates its gaze on Coriolanus (Tom Blyth), a stout, blond go-getter whose military-general father died in the country’s civil war. Now, he’s the nation’s top student and on the cusp of earning the Plinth Prize, whose monetary rewards will improve the impoverished circumstances of himself, his grandmother (Fionnula Flanagan), and his cousin Tigris (Hunter Schafer). Yet on the day of his triumph, he learns that, because of dwindling ratings for the Hunger Games—a competition in which randomly selected boys and girls (i.e., “tributes”) from the outlying districts are forced to fight to the death for broadcast audiences as punishment for their prior insurgency against the Capitol—things will be different for the event’s 10th iteration. Coriolanus and his classmates will now serve as mentors to the tributes, and the prevailing advisor will receive the reward.
Coriolanus doesn’t like this any more than the rest of his peers, including best friend Sejanus Plinth (Josh Andrés Rivera). While his wealthy dad issues the coveted prize, Sejanus loathes the cruelty and inequity of the Games, making no bones about wanting to halt them. Still, Coriolanus lucks out by being paired with Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler) from District 12, a member of a traveling performance troupe who wears her mom’s rainbow-colored dress and, upon being chosen to compete in the Hunger Games, distinguishes herself by sticking a snake down the back of a female rival. She then sings a touching song on stage, which is broadcast live throughout all of Panem. This isn’t the last time The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes will hinge on literal songbirds and snakes; as written by Michael Lesslie and Michael Arndt, the film is obvious to the point of leadenness. It’s also sketchily conceived, so that it just takes Coriolanus showing up at the Capitol train depot to meet Lucy Gray, then hopping into her transport vehicle, to make her trust him and cause him to swoon over her.