c/o Lionsgate
Are we all back in our “Hunger Games” eras? It’s not just me? Good. The newest entry to Suzanne Collins’ much beloved “Hunger Games” franchise takes a complete left turn by focusing its attention on the antagonist of the trilogy: President Coriolanus Snow. “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” first came out in print on May 19, 2020, from publisher Scholastic. Set just over six decades before the events of the original trilogy, the book follows a young, down-on-his-luck Coriolanus Snow, when he is made to serve as a mentor for Lucy Gray Baird—1 of 24 tributes during the 10th Annual Hunger Games.
The movie adaptation, released on Nov. 17, 2023, follows the same premise. In the time leading up to the movie’s release, there’s been a lot of buzz, speculation, and anxiety surrounding the adaptation. Choosing Snow as a central protagonist had already been divisive back when the novel was first announced, and franchise fans had their fair share of worries about how the movie would hold up. Collins is well-known for championing the 2010s young adult dystopia craze, and she remains one of the best dystopian authors to date.
Well, there’s no need to worry. Over Thanksgiving break, I went to my hometown’s local AMC to watch the movie with my younger sister who was, completely coincidentally, also home for Thanksgiving break. We bought our tickets six hours in advance, but even then, the showing was well on its way to being sold out. When the showing started—after the prerequisite 20 minutes of trailers, commercials, and that one Nicole Kidman AMC ad I know we all know—what greets you isn’t the usual dizzying whirl of excess and splendor that characterized the Capitol in the first set of movies. Rather, we’re thrust headfirst into what was known in-universe as the “Dark Days,” or the very first district rebellion, which sparked the creation of the Hunger Games.
We watched as a young Snow and his cousin, Tigris, tried to scavenge food from what looked to be a bombed-out shelter. Horror strikes us, as it does them, when we watch a man—likely another Capitol citizen—take an ax to a corpse’s leg in order to feed himself. This, followed by the cousins’ return home to the news that Coriolanus’ father has just been killed in District 12, pretty much sets the tone for “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.”
The rest of the movie is separated into three distinct parts—title cards pop up on screen to denote them, giving you cues as to what is about to unfold in this particular part of the film’s nearly three-hour-long runtime. In Act One, we’re re-introduced to Snow (Tom Blyth)—who is, despite his attempts to seem otherwise, nearly destitute. The Plinth Prize, a monetary grant offered to the top student from the Academy’s graduating class, is his chance to seize the means to bring his family back into prominence. This, of course, is unceremoniously ripped away from him when Dean Highbottom (Peter Dinklage) announces that the Plinth Prize will be a competition this year. All 24 graduates-to-be will be assigned to mentor that year’s 24 tributes—and whoever’s tribute comes out on top wins the prize. The Plinths’—a District 2 family that bought their way into Capitol society—only son, Sejanus (Josh Andrés Rivera), is incidentally Snow’s best friend. We’re also, in this segment of the movie, introduced to Dr. Voluminia Gaul (Viola Davis), the sadistic Head Gamemaker, and Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler), Snow’s tribute.
There’s not much I can say about this movie that likely hasn’t already been said. Tom Blyth, who was a relative unknown to me prior to this film, cuts a dashing figure as Coriolanus Snow, especially with those sweet, loose curls he rocks in Acts One and Two. Josh Andrés Rivera also delivers a compelling performance as Sejanus, who is both too sweet and too noble for his own good, caught between his identity as a member of District 2 and this new, Capitol-based life he’s been uprooted to. Viola Davis delivers a positively blood-curdling performance as the sinister Dr. Gaul, and the eerie way she carries herself had me tense every moment she was on screen. Rachel Zegler, who had garnered the most controversy and pushback of all the cast, proved every single one of her detractors wrong. She shines as both a brilliant actress and singer and brings an undeniable charm to Lucy Gray’s character.
As far as writing and pacing goes, there’s the usual critique that gets lobbed at any book-to-screen adaptation—mainly that the film could’ve stood to be longer. I, personally, haven’t yet read “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” but reliable sources (my friends back home) have informed me that the trajectory of events, both before and after the Games, was insanely truncated, cutting out a lot of character development and relationship building, both between Snow and Lucy Gray and Snow and Sejanus. I think the relationship that suffers the most from this truncation, however, is Snow and Gaul’s. Gaul ends up occupying a nebulous, mentor figure-shaped space in the film, and while this is present in the book, I’ve been made to understand that there’s much more build up to it than the movie’s few, sparse scenes.
But while I may have found the foundations of some of the core relationship shaky in places, one place where “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” shone for me was the music. Lucy Gray, as a member of the Covey, sings for a living—I imagine that was one of the reasons Rachel Zegler was cast, considering her background in musical theater—and the film features several original songs, written by Collins and performed by Lucy Gray. “The Old Therebefore” is my personal favorite—the song literally gave me chills.
Long—very, very long—story short, I thought “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” was a great film. Long-time fans of “The Hunger Games” may find it odd at first to be asked to sympathize with President Snow, but Blyth’s acting and the great writing make it easy to understand how he became what he is when Katniss and Peeta finally hit the stage. “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” does what any great prequel should do, providing us with a better understanding of the world of Panem and what events transpired to get us to the 74th Annual Hunger Games.
Final rating: 4.5 out of 5 rat-poison laced bottles of morphling.
Nicole Lee can be reached at nlee@wesleyan.edu.