Distributor: Lionsgate
Release Date: August 05, 2014
MSRP: $39.99
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Film: D+ / Video: B+ / Audio: A- / Extras: B-
The post-Twilight era’s spawning of female empowerment is thankfully here to stay for the foreseeable future, but takes an unsurprising backseat to formula and perfunctory filmmaking in Divergent, the latest young adult series hoping to hit it big. Director Neil Burger (Limitless) conjures up an ill-advised and glossy slickness that renders Divergent a heavily artificial and disposable slog. Sadly, female wish-fulfillment is the name of the game here, as the film’s futuristic dystopian society is just a common placeholder for the rote trappings already existing within the genre. For now, here sits another slouching and mindless first entry of a franchise void of proper stakes and characterizations, one that should fare very well at the MTV Movie Awards in the coming years.
The film takes place in Chicago where society has separated into 5 factions: Abegnation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Erudite (the intelligent), Amity (the peaceful), and Candor (the peaceful). Members join a faction based on their choice but are given a suggestion by an aptitude test. Jennifer Lawrence’s Katniss has never been missed so much, with “girl next door” Shailene Woodley (The Descendants) taking over the duties of heroine this time around. Woodley plays Tris, an admirer of Dauntless, whose eventual test shows attributes of several factions, which deems her divergent and a threat to social order. Tris eventually joins her admired group where for the rest of the film she engages in endless training and exposition sessions. In what could have easily been delivered via a simple montage, we instead watch as her soldier gang endlessly jog, leap out of speeding trains, scale up bridge beams and gets branded with tattoos. All of this quickly becomes an eye-rolling chore.
Woodley, who is more than game for the role, lacks the vital screen presence needed to keep us interested in her table-setting story that plays like an oppressed downgrade of previously seen action/sci-fi entries. Aside from a few vets like Kate Winslet (the straight-faced governing baddie) and Ashley Judd and Tony Goldwyn (Triss’s bemused parents), the rest of the cast is laced with up-and-comers: kind friend Christina (Zoë Kravitz); wiseass bully Peter (Miles Teller); tough-guy Macklemore doppelgänger Eric (Jai Courtney); and hunky love interest Four (Theo James), who is harboring some secrets of his own.
Weighed down by a narrative stuck in neutral, author Veronica Roth’s source material is ripe for criticism in the hands of screenwriters Evan Daugherty and Vanessa Taylor. Not only is Divergent insistent on spelling everything out for its viewer (the film never fails to remind us how dangerous Tris is to the regulated establishment), but there’s a vast shortage of anything significant taking place until the film settles into its action climax where the persecuted Tris finally gains agency and rises up against a conspiracy alongside Four.
Clocking in at a punishing 139 minutes, Divergent’s overarching theme of non-conformity and the hunt for personal identity deserves every ounce of scrutiny tossed its way. Maybe it’ll come through with more heft in future installments, but this film never shakes its mechanical and colorless funk. Without the hint of proper pacing and tangible characters, we’re also left with incoherent action and another half-assed dystopian framework. With two more films on the way and with a complete lack of excitement working against it in this chapter, Divergent fails to exist as a serviceable slice of pop entertainment.
A/V
For as lackluster as the film is, Divergent doesn’t disappoint in its high-definition video and audio presentations. Given the overwhelming gray and brown color palette that the film exudes, there’s a depth and sharpness on display in the rare moments that colors really do come popping out. For a blockbuster of this magnitude, the sound design works in nice unison with the numerous sound effects heard throughout the film.
Extras
Lionsgate’s disc boast two commentaries, one with Burger and the other with producers Lucy Fisher and Douglas Wick, and there’s enough inside info available to satisfy both the casual and hardcore Divergent fan. There’s also an extended featurette that explores the film’s adaptation to the big screen, the casting process, and the shoot. If viewers are looking for a more in-depth look inside the film’s faction systems, there’s a feature available that does little to shed light on the undeveloped factions. And to round it out, there’s 4 minutes of deleted scenes, a music video for Ellie Goulding’s song Beating Heart, and a few trailers.
Overall
Though the film itself isn’t up to snuff, the disc’s technical merits combined with the glut of features make this a no-brainer purchase for fans of the Divergent franchise.
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