The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013)

Picking up some months after the events of the first movie; Catching Fire finds our heroine, Katniss Everdeen, back in her home district and re-kindling, perhaps, her nascent romance with Gale (who was somewhat pushed to the sidelines of the first instalment) while struggling to walk a fine line of conformity and performance in her new, dangerously high-profile existence.

Incoming helmer Francis Lawrence, with relatively little big-budget movie experience, directs with a steady hand, keeping the look and tone consistent with the first movie. The opening act here is particularly strong, laced with political manoeuvring, surreptitiously tightening the screws and gently deepening even some of the more seemingly garish characters (the delirious Effie Trinket is particularly well-served this time round). This slow-burning first-half also allows Jennifer Lawrence, once again, to remind us all why she is one of the finest upcoming young actors of her generation, delivering duct-troubling eulogies from even the most threadbare material.

Things do however take a minor turn for the ho-hum once the new games get underway. Co-champion Peeta gets less to do this time and mostly just follows in Katniss's footsteps, which is a shame after his stronger showing the first time around and further undermines the love-triangle backdrop theoretically still being toyed with. More problematic though is the amount of repetition and familiarity, with many of the same beats being played as we experienced in the previous competition. For a near two-and-a-half hour movie, Catching Fire rather struggles to do what it says on the tin, taking rather too long to find its way out of the pitfalls of having to play out another set of games with a more-or-less matching dramatic arc to the first. Until, when finally the first really startling new development hits.... the credits role.

Reputation has it that the third and final book (being adapted, a-la Harry Potter, into two upcoming movies) is the weakest of the three, and so, while this central episode is a mostly solid outing that doesn't significantly squander the good work done by the first, it is nonetheless something of a concern then that it does have a touch of a holding pattern about it, teasing us that all the real fireworks are being held back till next year.

Rating: 3/5