The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes

Francis Lawrence sets Suzanne Collins’s prequel at the tenth Hunger Games, and like the novel it is cut into three parts, titled on screen as The Mentor, The Prize and The Peacekeeper. The division changes what to expect. The arena closes at the end of the second part, and what is left runs in District 12, outside the games. A viewer who assumes the arena is the climax finds it over with a long stretch still to go. Screenwriter Michael Lesslie says Collins insisted everything concerning Lucy Gray stay restricted to what Snow could witness, so her eventual fate would stay a mystery. The rule shows: the film ends without saying what became of her. The songs are performance, not playback. Collins wrote the lyrics, Dave Cobb set them, and Rachel Zegler recorded all her singing live on set; in Lawrence’s words, on a mic or a cappella, it was all live. The arena interior is Centennial Hall in Wrocław, the exterior is Berlin’s Olympiastadion, and District 12 is the industrial ruin of Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord. A good fit if you can take the games ending in the middle and the last part leaving the arena for District 12. Not for viewers who want a clear answer about Lucy Gray; the film withholds one on purpose.