Wednesday, June 10, 2015

The Divergent Series: Insurgent - 3 stars out of 10

The Divergent Series: Insurgent - 3 stars out of 10

“Insurgent” was a rather disappointing follow-up to the inspired dystopian thriller, “Divergent.”  The first  film was on par with “The Hunger Games” series but this installment plods along with less action and a storyline that lacks direction.  The first half of the film prepares us for war but the second half focuses on something totally different.  The issues in this film are not acting or editing related; instead, the story just isn’t as good.  The characters don’t really develop at all over the course of this film and there is very little plot for a 2-hour runtime.  Even though the box reveals the huge twist that we’ve been waiting for, they spend so much time trying to open it that we don’t even care by the end.  Not to mention, the twist would’ve been more effective if they hadn’t stolen it “The Maze Runner,” though the final scene still ended up being an incredible shocker.  One of the biggest strengths of this series was its use of Chicago landmarks to make the world seem more relatable and realistic than other films in this genre, but they completely lost sight of that in this sequel.  The strengths of this film are the same as “Divergent”: good acting from Shailene Woodley, Kate Winslet, and now Naomi Watts, and the uninhibited bravery of the Dauntless.  Unfortunately, “Insurgent” has a lot of weaknesses and I don’t know that it was good enough to get me out to see its two-part finale in 2016 and 2017.

[Pictured: Pay attention to this image, because it's basically half of the movie]

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