Director Francis Lawrence and Producer Nina Jacobson On ‘Grittier’ New ‘Hunger Games’ – CinemaCon

The last hunger games, takes place decades before the original, is darker and more “authentic” in some ways, but does not deviate from existential questions that are as relevant today as when the first films appeared, the director-producer of Ballads of Songbirds and Serpents.

“Are we worthy of freedom? Can’t handle freedom? What is the appeal of authoritarianism? Why are people drawn to handing over control to the government? And why would anyone want that kind of control?” asked producer Nina Jacobson during a Q&A with director Francis Lawrence on the sidelines of CinemaCon in Las Vegas. Lionsgate made its debut today during the presentation of the first trailer.

The films are based on the novels by Suzanne Collins. “The first books were really like the Forever Wars, you know, the endless fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and the aftermath of those wars. [And] the rise of american idol and reality television,” she said. The subject has “just become more relevant and topical”.

The challenge was to keep the story – set 64 years before the original – both familiar and fresh. The look is grimmer, modeled after postwar Berlin, Laurence said, where some of it was filmed. Panem is still rebuilding here after a brutal civil war, riddled with endless construction sites, cranes and the remnants of destruction.

“One of the things that really drew me to the novel itself was the sheer scope of the story. And the fact that it’s an origin story, not just a character that we all know from the other series, but the origin of Panem and the origin of the games. To be able to go back and rethink what the capital might look like not long after a war in that kind of rebuilding period,” he said.

The character is Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth), who channels a young Donald Sutherland but was more conflicted at age 18, long before establishing himself as Panem’s tyrannical president. Snow is someone “we’ve hated and hated for so long,” Jacobson said. So while it is “deeply rooted in the mythology of the original books and films [Ballads] doesn’t feel like it’s trying to duplicate. It breaks out into a whole new field and it also has a very different visual language because it is a historical film.

“It felt fresh, and it felt new, and the tone is a little different, and I think the tone is a little rawer, and I would even say a little more authentic,” Lawrence said.

The film will premiere on November 17. Rachel Zegler is Snow’s foil, girl tribute Lucy Gray Baird. Peter Dinklage and Viola Davis also shine.