The Guardian’s Five Challenges for Francis Lawrence
The bevy of articles regarding Francis Lawrence’s appointment continues, and this time The Guardian UK have nominated five challenges facing Lawrence for ‘Catching Fire’:
1. Time – “…with star Jennifer Lawrence’s commitment to a second X Men: First Class film, that means a pretty preposterous August start date for the Catching Fire shoot, requiring Francis Lawrence to hone a completed screenplay by Slumdog Millionaire’s Simon Beaufoy in just a few months…at least a lot of the prep work has already been done and a screenplay, cast, and many of the locations are already in place (or can be recycled) from the first film.”
2. Maintain the pace – “Catching Fire takes rather longer to get going as it deals with the aftermath of Everdeen’s joint victory with Peeta Mellark. Much of the slack before we return to the action is taken up with fairly vital background on the emerging anti-Capitol movement in various districts, and Francis Lawrence won’t be able to excise it because it has ramifications for the rest of the series…the new director will have to find a way of showing this without departing from the blitzkrieg-paced tournament scenes for too long.”
3. Create room for Gale – “Audiences will be expecting to see more of a character upon whom the entire series’ dynamic depends, but Gale is a little thinly drawn in the books and may need some help from the screenwriters. Fortunately Liam Hemsworth did such a good job in the first film that it wasn’t hard to see why our heroine might be drawn to him.”
4. Keep away from the Twilight – “Ross and Jennifer Lawrence did such a fabulous job of presenting Everdeen as a tough, independent young woman that it would be a pity to see her transformed into a swooning little flower in the sequel. Fortunately, Collins makes it clear that her heroine is fairly interested in romance but really rather more bothered about staying alive and keeping her family from being throttled by the powers that be. There’s no need for Catching Fire to doff its cap to the Twilight crowd, and we must hope the new director realises he has a more wholesome proposition on his hands.”
5. Find the political satire within – “Catching Fire offers us a wider glimpse of Panem society, its cruelty and its overconfidence. In the decade of the Arab spring and the ongoing protests in Russia, here is a film with a real opportunity to reflect our changing global political arena…It might sound a little over-ambitious to expect a blockbuster Hollywood movie to act as a Trojan horse for anti-authoritarian polemic, but a Catching Fire without a few satirical nods to real-life events would be an opportunity sorely missed.”
Looks like The Guardian are mirroring most of the fan concerns, particularly regarding time not only to shoot, but to include pivotal back story as well. I’m remaining hopeful that Francis Lawrence will be able to deliver, after all, he has such good source material 
You can read their full responses here.
Well… good source material from the book at any rate, we don’t know what the script is like – hopefully Suzanne Collins is casting her eagle eye over it
I remain positive at any rate, I have to!
This is exactly why I felt if any book should be split into two movies, it should be Catching Fire. The material is too extensive but necessary to fully grasp where the story is heading. This concerns me b/c they are things that will get left out. But that’s why I suggest to anyone, you have to read the books for the complete depth.
Yeah this movie/ book adaption is going to be really hard??
So did he except the job or not or are they in negotiations ??
6: Do EXACTLY what they tell you to do!
Two things I read recently that actually makes me feel SOMEWHAT better about this whole debacle.
“So what does the studio need? Someone who is hungry and willing to; fulfill the prior director’s establishing vision, allow the studio to control their version of the story, not mess it up. ”
“Why did Lawrence land the gig? Like many video directors, and judging from his past films, Lawrence has visual chops and can handle VFX. As for telling a strong story with dimensional characters–on that front Lionsgate and producer Nina Jacobson will be all over him. ”
You better be Nina. You better not let him out of your sight for a second.
Points 3 and 4 seem to negate each other. Sure more stuff happens to Gale in Catching Fire, but I don’t want lingering shots of him just to establish his relationship with Katniss. If there is one thing, I hated about THG is us having to see Gale watching the games. It’s pretty obvious what they are trying to set up.
I hope he does a good job because I thought personally that ross did a grate job. Out of all three books I hated that one the most intill the games COME ON LAWRENCE
I hope they don’t make the instances prior to the game a mere checklist of things to get done. They are only in the arena for 48 hours or so and the books aren’t really about the games but the broader situation throughout Panem. As far as political satire, I think those points are almost painfully obvious. I mean yes it’s wrong for one group of people to exert an iron will upon another group of people with no allowances for freedom or basic human rights. It’s wrong to send teenagers into an arena to fight to the death. Collins chose obvious and universally morally repugnant political themes and I’m sure even Hollywood can handle them.
Hopefully this guy will be as good as Gary,if not better!! And I also hope that they make the not so important scenes as emotional as they are in the book eg the morpling death scene!!!!
@AnvilGate that is so true b/c that really was the whole concept around Twilight lol! But yeah the set up for Gale will def be put in there since he does profess his love to her along with a smooch, I just don’t want them to make it extra and stray from the book. It just needs to be present enough to show her internal dilemma with sorting her feelings for him and of course Peeta.
@Destined– agreed. when they said they might split mockingjay in two i wondered why they didn’t do that with catching fire instead. seems like CF has a much clearer split point, but i guess the “trendy” thing is to split the last book, instead. =/
meanwhile, i think points 2 and 3 are key. i think a lot of the D12 parts can be reduced to just the critical moments, because there isn’t as much world-building to be done this time (which took gary ross pretty much half of the first movie), but on the other hand reducing D12 leaves very little room for gale to be developed. they have to find a balance between those two, and it’s a very delicate balance at that. beaufoy, i trust you. please don’t mess it up.
(btw, i couldn’t help but smile when they said liam “did such a good job” on THG. his role was so small, most of the critics have overlooked him, but i thought he did damn good, really came across as gale to me, and i’m so glad he’s getting at least a little bit of recognition from the media).
as for the 4th point, i’m not concerned right now. i’m sure as soon as lawrence accepts the deal (HAS he accepted it yet? i know he hasn’t rejected it, but…), the first thing nina jacobson & co. will do is sit him down and go: “okay, rule one: this CANNOT be twilight. got that?” so for the moment, i’m not nervous about the romance. maybe when footage actually starts being released that might change, but right now, i’m feeling confident about the triangle aspect of this, and that they’ll handle it well.
#3…As far as Gale’s characterization goes, he’s going to garner a lot of sympathy for the whipping. I think they need to establish his escalating resentment of the Capitol and his willingness to fight back using whatever means necessary. Â
#4…Just  because there is a love story, it certainly doesn’t have to devolve into Twilight. Nor does it need to be cliche or trite. In fact, this “triangle” is somewhat unorthodox, and serves as a metaphor of the need for balance, personally and politically, going forward in the broken world of Panem.  It also enlightens Katniss’s “coming of age” and her struggle to maintain her humanity in the face of the horrors of war. There is a middle ground between Bella Swan and a “futuristic Joan of Arc,” and it can’t be that hard to illustrate. I really don’t want them to turn Katniss into a revolutionary, strictly survivalist superhero in effort to attempt “a more wholesome proposition.”
CF is not a long book, but way too much is explained and occurs, for all to be included in 2 and a quarter hours. Â I feel pretty certain that this movie is going to differ from the book quite a bit more than the first one, and it’s really unavoidable. I’m concerned about what they will trim, and only hope that they are able to still maintain the integrity of the plot and relationships going forward.
they might decide make this movie a bit longer. thg was only 2 hours long, the credits took about 15 minutes. i can see them making cf 10-15 minutes longer. there are basically three segments in the book: district 12, the victory tour, and the quarter quell. as someone said in the comments, they are in the arena for a short amount of time, 2 or 3 days if i remember correctly, of course they are going to amp it up, as the action in the arena has its appeal and a lot of people like this series for the action as well as the messages and characters in the story. as for turning katniss into a damsel in distress, i doubt it, simply because jennifer´s caliber as an actress makes her come across as really strong no matter what she does. she knows how to play this character. i can´t wait to see official word from lionsgate regarding francis lawrence´s acceptance of the job, and mostly, i wanna hear what mr lawrence has to say about this story. i hope he´s smart enough to see all the layers and ramifications of catching fire.
@AnvilGate – I interpret point 4 as referring to Bella being such a vapid twit, not necessarily to the presence of the triangle itself. In that sense they’re perfectly complementary.
I’m going to be pretty angry if Gale winds up getting all the character development in CF that Peeta should’ve gotten in THG. And I wish the studio would stop being so afraid of the triangle. It actually does exist, and if they choose to they can handle it much better than Twilight did.
As much as Gale needs character development, Peeta needs some development as well, and it must be established that he loves Katniss unconditionally even when he realizes that she does not love him back
@Cory omg yes! That is exactly what needs to be shown, especially for the emotional set up post Catching Fire heading into Mockingjay. That is so essential to this story I hope they convey that on screen.