Kurt Loder on The Hunger Games

Anyone who has read the 2008 bestseller on which it's based will encounter no surprises in The Hunger Games, observes Kurt Loder. Once again we're in the post-apocalyptic country of Panem—formerly North America before an unspecified disaster wiped out that civilization some years earlier. Panem is divided into 12 heavily oppressed Districts ruled with a steel fist by the merciless President Snow (Donald Sutherland, little-seen) in the faraway Capitol. There was once a thirteenth District, but it grew rebellious and was destroyed. Cowed by that intimidating example, the remaining populace lives in conditions of soul-draining deprivation, meekly acquiescent. But the Capitol's vengeance is ongoing: It has instituted an annual event called the Hunger Games, for which "Tributes"—one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18—are selected from each District to gather in an arena and engage in armed combat until all but one have been killed.